diff options
Diffstat (limited to '17418-8.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | 17418-8.txt | 9562 |
1 files changed, 9562 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/17418-8.txt b/17418-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e02d1c1 --- /dev/null +++ b/17418-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9562 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Black Pearl, by Mrs. Wilson Woodrow + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Black Pearl + + +Author: Mrs. Wilson Woodrow + + + +Release Date: December 30, 2005 [eBook #17418] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLACK PEARL*** + + +E-text prepared by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Graeme Mackreth, and the +Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team +(https://www.pgdp.net/) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 17418-h.htm or 17418-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/4/1/17418/17418-h/17418-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/4/1/17418/17418-h.zip) + + + + + +THE BLACK PEARL + +by + +MRS. WILSON WOODROW + +Author of "Sally Salt," "The New Missioner," Etc. + +Illustrated + + + + + + + +[Illustration: "'I'm feelin' particularly good right now.'" (Page 181)] + + + + + +New York and London +D. Appleton and Company +1912 +Copyright, 1912, by +D. Appleton and Company +Published August, 1912 +Printed in the United States of America + + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + + "'I'm feelin' particularly good right now'"--(Frontispiece) + + "I'll show you what I'll do'" 102 + + "There stood the Black Pearl alone" 244 + + "Holding cautiously to a little branch, she bent over him" 302 + + + + +THE BLACK PEARL + +CHAPTER I + + +It was just at sunset that the train which had crawled across the desert +drew up, puffing and panting, before the village of Paloma, not many +miles from the Salton Sea. After a moment's delay, one lone passenger +descended. Paloma was not an important station. + +Rudolf Hanson, the one passenger, whom either curiosity or business had +brought thither, stood on the platform of the little station looking +about him. To the right of him, beyond the village, blooming like an +oasis from the irrigation afforded by the artesian wells, rose the +mountains, the foothills green and dimpled, the slopes with their massed +shadows of pines and oaks climbing upward and gashed with deep purple +cañons, and above them the great white, solemn peaks, austere and +stately guardians of the desert which stretched away and away, its +illimitable distances lost at last in the horizon line. + +Hanson, of the far west, was used to magnificent scenic effects, but the +desert that sparkled like the gold of man's eternal quest, that lay with +its sentinel hills enfolded and encompassed in color, colors that +seemed as if some spinner of the sunset courts wove forever fresh +combinations and sent these ethereal tapestries out to float over the +wide spaces of the wilderness--this caused him to catch his breath and +exclaim. + +It was truly a sight to take any man's breath away; but even such a view +could only arrest Hanson's interest temporarily. He was hungry, and the +station agent, a weedy youth, was making a noisy closing up. +Intentionally noisy, for when one is the agent of a small desert +station, the occasional visitor is apt to whet one's curiosity to razor +edge. + +Roused by these sounds, and by his growing hunger, which the cool purity +of the air only augmented, Hanson turned to the boy. + +"Where's a place to stay?" he asked. + +"There ain't but one," replied the youth; "the San Gorgonio hotel. You +walk right up this street until you come to it, on the left side. It's +got a sign out, electric," he added with some pride. He looked curiously +at Hanson, standing tall and straight with his ruddy, good-looking face, +keen, quick, gray eyes and curling light hair. "Going to be here long?" +he asked tentatively. + +"I don't know," returned Hanson idly. "Guess not. No string on me, +though, even if I'd choose to put in a month or so here. This way, you +say?" He lifted his suit case and began to walk in the direction the +station agent had indicated. + +"Say," the latter called after him, "you don't want to miss the show +to-night." + +"What show?" Hanson turned, interest amounting almost to eagerness in +his tone. + +"Benefit." The boy rolled the word unctuously under his tongue. "I guess +maybe you saw why in the papers. The river got on a tear and cut into a +nice little town here on the desert, drowned some of the folks and did a +lot of damage generally, so we're raising some money to send to 'em." + +The stranger's interest had increased perceptibly. "Sounds good to me," +he said heartily. "What's your features?" + +"Just one," the other answered impressively. "We don't need no more in +this part of the world, if we got her." + +"Her!" cried Hanson, and now his cold eyes were alight. "Who the hell is +her?" + +"Why, the Black Pearl!" as if surprised that anyone should be unaware of +the fact. "'Course we got a few thousand square miles of desert waiting +to be reclaimed, and any amount of mountains full of ore, but to us +they's small potatoes and few in a hill beside the Black Pearl." + +Hanson swore softly and ecstatically. "If that ain't that good old blind +luck of mine hitting me again after all these years," he muttered. "Say, +son, I'm making no secret of my business. Don't have to. I am a +theatrical manager--vaudeville. Got great backing this year and am out +for new features. Set my heart on the Black Pearl and got to figuring on +her. Sweeney had her on his circuit last winter. Well, Sweeney, let me +tell you, is pretty shrewd. He knows a good thing when he's got it, so +I thought there was no show for me. Presently, I hear that she's +scrapped with Sweeney and is off to the desert like a flash. So she's +really here?" + +"Sure," said the boy. + +"So," continued Hanson, who was loquacious by nature, but sufficiently +shrewd and experienced only to let himself be so when he thought it +worth his while, "I begin to figure on my chances. I learn that +Sweeney's trying to coax her back by letter, so I says to myself: +'Rudolf, you just chassez down to Paloma and see what you can do,' but +honest, son," he put his suit case down in the road and pushed his hat +back on his head and put his hands on his hips, "honest to God, I didn't +expect anything like this, the first night I got here, too." + +His companion shifted his quid of tobacco to the other side of his mouth +and nodded understandingly. + +Hanson's eyes were fixed ruminatively but unseeingly upon the golden +desert, its sand dunes touched with a deep rose soon to be eclipsed by +the jealous tyrian purples which were beginning to mass themselves +gorgeously beneath the oranges and flame of the setting sun. + +"Gee whiz!" he muttered, "and I was figuring that if I hung round here a +week or so and played my hand all right, I'd maybe get her to do a few +steps for me in the parlor. Oh, Lordy! And now I got a chance to see her +before the footlights and size up her capacity for getting over them." + +The station agent looked puzzled and a little offended. "There won't be +any footlights," he said; "and you're mistaken if you think she's up to +any rough work like climbing over them, any way." + +Hanson laughed loudly. "That's all right, son, you ain't on to the shop +talk, that's all. But now, where is this show and what time does it +begin?" + +"Oh, in an hour or so, whenever Pearl's minded, and it's to be held at +Chickasaw Pete's place--saloon. You see," apologetically, "we ain't a +very big community, and that's the only place where there's a decent +floor for her to dance on." + +Hanson raised his brows and laughed. "Well"--he pulled out his watch and +looked at it--"I've got time to wash the upper crust of sand off anyway, +and get a bite or so first. I suppose I'll see you later. Up this way, +you say?" + +The agent nodded assent. "It's a good betting proposition," he mused. +"He knows what he wants and he usually gets it, I'm thinking, or there's +something to pay. But what'll the Pearl do? I guess she's the biggest +gamble any man could tackle." + +As his new acquaintance had predicted, Hanson had no difficulty in +finding the San Gorgonio, a small hostelry not by any means so gorgeous +as its name implied, being merely an unpretentious frame building with a +few palms in the enclosure before it, and there he speedily got a room +and some supper. It might be deemed significant that he gave more time +and attention to his toilet than his food, but that may have been +because he believed in the value of a pleasing appearance as well as in +a winning address when transacting business with a woman. In any event, +his motives, whatever they might be, were quite justifiable, as he +undoubtedly possessed a bold and striking type of good looks which had +never failed of receiving a due appreciation from most women. + +Assured, aggressive, his customary good humor heightened by the +comforting sense of his luck being with him, he finally emerged into the +open air to discover that the stars were out and that it might be later +than he thought. The air, infinitely pure, infinitely fresh, exhaled +from the vast, breathing desert, and the delicious aromatic desert odors +touched him like a caress. He drew them in in great draughts. The air +seemed to him a wonderful, potent ichor infusing him with a new and +vigorous life. Hanson was sure of himself always, but now, in this +awakened sense of such power and dominance as he had never known, he +threw back his head and laughed aloud. + +"Gosh!" he muttered, "I feel like all I got to do was to reach up and +pull down a few of those stars and use them for poker chips." He exulted +like a sleek and lordly animal in this thrilling vitality, this +imperious and insistent demand for conquest. + +Chickasaw Pete's place, as he soon discovered, was no more pretentious +in appearance than the San Gorgonio. It also was a long, low frame +building with some great cottonwood trees before it and a few palms with +their infinite and haunting suggestions of the tropics. + +It was with a sense of mounting excitement which still held that strong +element of exultation that Hanson crossed the porch, opened the door and +walked in. He saw before him a long room well lighted with electricity +and with a shining polished floor. The bar ran along one side, and +behind it lounged a short, stout, round-faced man with very black hair +and eyes and a perpetual smile. This was the bar-keeper, known +familiarly as Jimmy. At the rear of the room, covering about half of the +floor, were rows and rows of chairs, occupied by both men and women, +strong, sun-burned looking people in the main, but with the invariable +and unmistakable sprinkling of "lungers" in various stages of recovery. + +Hanson saw his friend, the station agent, leaning across the bar talking +to Jimmy, and knew from the interested glances cast in his direction +that he was the topic of conversation. + +At the opposite end of the room was a piano. A young man sat before it +facing the wall, while beside him there stood a woman intently tuning a +violin which she held tucked under her chin. Approaching middle age, she +was rather stout, with a sallow, discontented face, which yet held some +traces of its former evanescent prettiness. Both lashes and brows of her +faded light eyes were heavily blackened, and the rouge which lay thickly +on her cheeks only served to accentuate their haggard lines. The hair, +dark at the roots, was blondined to a canary color where it rolled back +under her hat, large and black, of a dashing Gainsborough style and +covered with faded red roses. For the rest, her costume consisted of a +white shirt waist, a wine-colored skirt and shoes with very high heels +which were conspicuously, and no doubt uncomfortably, run over. + +Her violin finally tuned to her satisfaction, she bent her head to speak +to the young man at the piano. He turned to answer her, and for a moment +his delicate, sad face was outlined against the wall behind him. Then, +with an emphatic little nod, he began to play and the woman lifted her +violin and swung in with him. + +The only virtue she possessed as a violinist was that she kept good +time, but although it was extremely unlikely that any member of that +audience recognized the fact, the boy was a musician by the divine right +of gift, a gift bestowed at birth. A wheezy old piano, and yet he drew +from it sweet and thrilling notes; a hackneyed, cheap waltz measure, and +yet he invested it with the glamour of romance. + +A ripple stirred all those waiting people, as a wind stirs a field of +wheat, a movement of settling and attention. Hanson, who had been +careful to secure a seat in the front row of chairs, was conscious that +his heart was beating faster. + +"This is where she whirls in through that door by the piano," he +muttered to himself with the acumen born of long knowledge of the stage +and its conventions. He had a swift mental vision of a graceful painted +creature, all undulating movement, alluring smiles, twinkling feet and +waving arms. This passed with a slight shock as a girl entered the door +by the piano, as he had foreseen, and walked indifferently to the +center of the room, and then, without a bow to her audience, began, +still with an air of languor and absorption, to take vague, sliding +steps, gradually falling in with the waltz rhythm, but, even so, the +movement was without any definite form, certainly not enough to call it +a dance. + +As she swayed about, listless, apparently indifferent to any effect she +might be producing, Hanson had a full opportunity to study her, and, in +that concentrated attention, the man and the manager were fused. He was +at once the cynical showman discounting every favorable impression and +the most critical and disillusioned of audiences. + +In this dancer he saw a woman who was like the desert willow and younger +than he had supposed; straight and supple, with a body of such +plasticity, such instant response to the directing will of its possessor +as only comes from the constant and arduous exercises begun in early +childhood. + +"Been trained for it since she was born, almost," was Hanson's first +unspoken comment. + +She wore a soft, clinging frock of scarlet crêpe. It was short enough to +display her ankles, slender for a dancer, and her arched feet in +heelless black slippers. In contrast to her red frock was a string of +sparkling green stones which fell low on her breast. Her long, brown +fingers blazed with rings, and in her ears, swinging against her olive +cheeks, were great hoops of dull gold. Her black shining hair was +gathered low on her neck, her unsmiling lips were scarlet as a +pomegranate flower, and exquisitely cut; and the fainter, duskier +pomegranate bloom on her oval cheeks faded into delicate stains like +pale coffee beneath her long, narrow eyes. + +"She ain't done a thing yet; she ain't even showed whether she can dance +a few bars or not, but, Lord! how she has got over!" was Hanson's +unspoken comment. "Clean to the back seats. There's nobody else here." + +Although still aimlessly moving with the rhythm of the waltz she no +longer merely followed the music. She and it were one now. And Hanson, a +connoisseur, familiar with the best, at least in his part of the world, +recognized the artist whose technique is so perfect that it is absorbed, +assimilated and forgotten; but its essence remains, nevertheless, a sure +foundation upon which to build securely future combinations and +improvisations. + +The Black Pearl was generous to-night. She was the program--its one +feature. She gave the audience its money's worth, judged by their +standards, which were measured by time; and yet, when she finished, she +gave one no idea of having exhausted her repertoire. In fact, she could +not have defined that repertoire. Dancing was her expression, and the +Black Pearl was conscious of infinite and unsounded phases of self. + +Most of the features of the program were familiar to Hanson by her +reputation. They included some old Spanish dances, some gypsy ones and +others manifestly her own. But dancer though she was by nature and +training, her personality dominated and eclipsed her art. + +Hanson was not imaginative, but as he watched her he seemed to be gazing +at some gorgeous cactus blossom opening its scentless petals to the +burning sun. Beneath and beyond her stretched the gray wastes of the +desert turning to gold under her feet, but still untrammeled and +merciless, holding strange secrets close to its savage heart; now, +exerting all its magic of illusion in delicate and exquisite mirages, +all of its luring fascination which has drawn men to it from the +beginning of the world; and now revealing itself desolate and unashamed +in all of its repulsive, stark aridity. + +The Pearl certainly made no effort to attract. If a glance from those +narrow eyes enthralled, it stung too. It was the flame of wine in the +blood, the flick of a whip on the raw, which roused in a man's heart, in +Hanson's at least, the passionate disposition to conquer and subdue. + +Finally she gave a slight signal to the musicians, her steps slowed, the +music stopped, and she went over and sat down beside the woman, who had +placed her violin on the piano, and then flung herself into a chair, +where she sat, carefully dabbing her warm brow with her handkerchief. + +The vague pictures which Hanson had been seeing vanished. "Gee! She got +me going!" he said to himself, half dazedly, "hypnotized me sure." This, +the manager. But the man exulted: "She ain't easy. She ain't easy." + +The moment the Pearl stopped dancing the audience was on its feet +applauding, and then, to a man, it eddied about her, casting banknotes +into her lap. These she lifted in handfuls and gave to two men who had +sat down beside her to count, while a third bent over them watching the +operation. + +Hanson, although he had drawn nearer her, still stood on the edge of the +crowd, leaning against the bar. "So that's the Black Pearl!" he said +presently to the bar-keeper. + +"That's her," responded Jimmy equably. "Can't be beat. What'll you +have?" + +"Nothing, just yet. Say, those stones around her neck look good to me." +Hanson narrowed his eyes. + +"Good!" Jimmy laughed shortly, a characteristic, mirthful little +chuckle. "I guess so. Bob Flick, up there beside Pearl, counting that +money, he gave 'em to her after she found him when he'd been lost on the +desert about three days. I'll tell you about it when I got more time." + +Hanson had been conscious from time to time of the close but furtive +scrutiny of the man whom the bar-keeper had designated as Bob Flick, and +now he, in turn, made Flick an object of observation. + +He saw a tall man of noticeable languor and deliberation of movement, +doubtless so long studied that it had become natural. His face, with +regular, rather aquiline features, was devoid of expression, almost +mask-like, while the deep lines about the mouth and eyes showed that he +lived much in the hard, brilliant, western sunlight. + +Hanson was quick enough to size up a man and a situation. "I'll make a +note to look out for you," he thought, "just about as cold and just +about as deadly as a rattler." + +"Say," he turned to Jimmy again, "I want to meet her. I'm a theatrical +manager, always looking out for new turns. Heard of this Black Pearl and +thought I'd run down and sign her up if I could." + +"She does go traveling once in a while," returned Jimmy dubiously, "but +it's all in the mood she's in whether she'll let you even talk to her. +You might as well count on the desert out there as the Pearl." + +"I suppose she's out for big money?" queried Hanson. + +"She'll get all she can, I guess," Jimmy chuckled. "But," he added +boastfully, "she can make big money by staying right here. Look at what +she's pulled in to-night. And there's her father, old Gallito, he's got +more than one good 'prospect,' and is foreman beside of one of the big +mines in the mountains. And her mother, there, that played the violin, +she's got some nice irrigated land, and even Hughie, that played, he +makes money playing for dances in the different towns. Oh, they're smart +folks." + +"Is Hughie the brother?" asked Hanson, looking at the boy, who sat +listlessly at the piano. + +"No. Adopted." Jimmy spoke briefly. "Born blind, but let me tell you, he +sees considerable more than those of us who have eyes." + +"Well, the Pearl's a certain winner," said the manager earnestly, "a +flower of the desert, a what-you-may-call-'em, a cactus bloom." + +"Correct, and don't forget the spines," chuckled Jimmy. "Looks as if +they were all out to-night, too. Kind of sulky, ain't she? Well, did you +say you was waitin' to be introduced? I'll take you up and ask her. Like +as not, she'll turn you down. She ain't looked at you once, I notice. I +been watching her." + +"So've I," said Hanson good humoredly, "but you're wrong, son"--there +was a brief, triumphant flash of his light eyes--"she's looked at me +twice, took me all in, too. Numbered the hairs of my head and the size +of my shoes. Threw a search light on my heart and soul. Gee! It felt +like the violet rays. Now, look here, friend, I ain't going to take +chances on a turn-down, nor of your Mr. Bob Flick having fun all night +shooting holes in the floor while this little Johnny Tenderfoot does his +imitation Black Pearl dancing. Listen," he tapped the bar sharply, "when +I meet the Black Pearl, it's because she requested an introduction. You +take me up to that old lion tamer, her mother." + +Jimmy threw him a glance of ungrudging admiration. "You ain't so dumb," +he vouchsafed. "Say, have one on me." + +"A little later," replied the other. "Never drink during business +hours." + +A small table had been placed before Mrs. Gallito, upon which were two +glasses, one of beer for herself, and one of lemonade for her daughter. + +As Jimmy performed the introduction, she put down her beer from which +she had been somewhat thirstily drinking and received Hanson with a +perfunctory bow and a brief mechanical smile. "Think of settling here?" +she asked politely. + +"No, I'm just down for a few days," replied Hanson genially. He had +drawn a chair up and seated himself on the other side of the table, +directly opposite Mrs. Gallito and her daughter. + +The surprise of the glance she threw at him was heightened by a quick +curiosity. "Just prospecting?" she asked. "I saw at once that you +weren't a 'lunger.' I didn't think you were an engineer, so I made up my +mind that you were looking for land." + +"None of them," returned Hanson, smiling, and hastened to inform her of +his real calling. Immediately she relaxed, her smile became genuine, the +bored and constrained politeness vanished from her manner. + +"Well, that is certainly nice," she exclaimed with real animation and +cordiality. "I'm always glad to meet any of the profession. No folks +like your own folks, you know." She bridled a little. + +"That's so," agreed Hanson heartily. "I knew the minute that I saw you +that you belonged." + +She lifted her head with a gesture of pride, the glow and color came +back into her face, giving it a transitory appearance of youth, and +restoring, for a fugitive moment, something of its vanishing beauty. + +"Born to it," she said. "My mother and her mother, and my father and his +father, and, 'way back on both sides, was all circus people. Yes, I was +born in the sawdust--rode--drove--tight-rope--trapeze--learned dancing +on the side--ambitious, you know. Say, you must have heard of my +mother--greatest bare-back rider ever in the ring. Isobel Montmorenci. +English, you know. I wasn't so shy myself, Queenie Madrew." + +"Gee! Well, you were some. Shake." Hanson extended his hand, which Mrs. +Gallito shook warmly. "And I do remember your mother. I should say so. +First time I went to the circus, I was about ten years old--ran off you +know. Knew well enough what I'd get when I turned up at home. Pop laying +for me with a strap. Goodness! It takes me right back. It's all a kind +of jumble, sawdust ring and animals and clowns and all; but what I do +remember plain is Isobel Montmorenci, her and a big black horse she was +riding." + +"Cæsar!" cried Mrs. Gallito excitedly. "Lord! don't I remember! I +learned to ride on him." + +"Yes," mused the manager, "all I recall of that circus is her and my two +nickels. I broke my bank to get 'em. They seemed a fortune to me; but +even then I was a shrewd kid and meant to get my money's worth. +Well--the first one I laid out in a great tall glass of lemonade. Say, +that was the first time I came up against the disillusions of life. +Nothing but a little sweetened water. The next nickel went for peanuts, +and they were too stale for even a kid to chew." + +"Ain't that just like a young one at the circus!" Mrs. Gallito laughed +loudly. + +"What's the joke, mom?" drawled a lazy, sliding, soft voice on the +other side of her. + +"A circus story, honey. Oh!" as the sudden formal silence recalled her +to her duty. "I forget. You two ain't been introduced, have you? Pearl, +make you acquainted with Mr. Hanson. He's in the show business." + +Pearl bowed without lifting her eyes, giving Hanson ample opportunity to +note the incredible length, as it seemed to him, of the upcurling lashes +upon her smooth cheeks. But just as he bent forward to speak to her, she +half-turned from him and said something to one of the men beside her. + +The manager's quickness saved him. He was perfectly aware of all those +jealous masculine eyes, flickering now with repressed and delighted +laughter over his discomfiture. He recovered himself in a moment and +slipped easily and with unabated geniality into a conversation with Mrs. +Gallito. + +"Funny you should marry out of the profession," deftly catching up his +threads. + +"She didn't," again that soft, sliding voice. "Pop was born in the +sawdust, too." + +Without a change of expression in his face, Hanson waited imperturbably +for Mrs. Gallito's answer. Since his eyes were fixed on the red spark at +the end of his cigarette, who could see the quick flash in them? + +Mrs. Gallito took a hasty gulp of beer. "It's just like Pearl says," she +murmured. "Her pop came of a long line of circus people, same as me, but +he broke clean away from it, couldn't bear the life." There was +unabated wonder in her tones. "I guess," resignedly, "it's the Spanish +of him." + +"Say," cried Hanson, and now his voice rang with a new note in it, +something of gay, masterful, masculine dominance, "say, what you ladies +drinking beer and lemonade for? It's got to be wine to-night. Hey, +Jimmy. Wine for this table, and treat the house. Wine, understand? Got +enough to float 'em?" + +"Hold on a minute, Jimmy." Hanson heard Bob Flick's voice for the first +time, soft as the Pearl's, liquidly southern, gentle, even apologetic. +"I'm sorry, stranger"--he leaned forward courteously to Hanson--"we all +would enjoy accepting your hospitality, but you see, it ain't +etiquette." + +A silence that could be felt had fallen upon the room. Mrs. Gallito, +pale under her paint, was nervously biting her handkerchief and glancing +from one man to the other, while the Pearl leaned back in her chair as +lazily, languidly, scornfully indifferent as ever. + +Then Hanson laughed, and a little thrill went over the room. The new man +was game. "Ain't that just your ruling, stranger?" he asked pleasantly. +"Since we've not been introduced, I can't call your name. But I hold +that it is etiquette. Jimmy, get on your job. The occasion when I first +set my eyes upon the Black Pearl has got to be honored." + +"Hold on just a moment, Jimmy." It was Flick now. "You see," again to +Hanson, his voice more apologetic than ever, "you being new here, +naturally don't understand. It ain't etiquette on a Benefit night, when +Miss Pearl Gallito, whose name you have, most unfortunately, just +miscalled, condescends to dance. I'm afraid I got to ask you to take +back your order and to apologize to Miss Gallito." + +Hanson was on his feet in a minute. "I'm sure ready now and always to +apologize my humblest to Miss Gallito, although I don't know what's the +offense. But the order stands." + +"Oh, Pearl," wailed her mother, "you raise mischief wherever you go. You +know Bob wouldn't go on so if you'd ask him to stop. You just like to +raise the devil." + +Then, for the first time, the Pearl's face became animated. It broke +into brilliance, her eyes gleamed, she showed her white teeth when she +laughed. + +"Quit your fooling, both of you," she said composedly, rising to her +feet. "I ain't going to have tales flying all over the desert about the +ructions stirred up the night I danced for the benefit of the flood +sufferers. Shake hands, you two," imperiously. "Go on, do what I tell +you. That's right," as the two men perfunctorily shook hands. "Bob don't +mean a thing, Mr. Hanson. It's just his temper, and there ain't going to +be any wine, because I'm going home, but--" and here she smiled into his +eyes--"you can walk a piece of the way with me, if you want to. Come on, +mother and Hughie. Good-night, Bob." + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Hanson had decided that the best way to gain certain information he +desired was to seek the bar-keeper, who, after his constitution, +gossiped as naturally and as volubly as a bird sings; so, quite early +the next morning, he sauntered into Chickasaw Pete's place. + +Jimmy, who was industriously polishing the bar and singing the while one +of the more lugubrious and monotonous hymns, looked up with his +customary little chuckle. + +"Feeling fine, ain't you?" he said derisively. "Want to start right out +and corral the whole desert, don't you? Think you can travel right over +to San Bernardino yonder? Looks about three miles off, don't he?" + +"Me?" said Hanson, expanding his chest. "I feel like I was about +sixteen. Like I was home in Kaintucky, jumping a six-bar fence after a +breakfast of about fifty buckwheat cakes and syrup." + +"That's the way it takes them all; but you just wait until about noon, +and you won't feel so gay," warned Jimmy. "What are you doin' to-day, +anyway, hunting more trouble?" + +"Not me," cried the other. "I came here to the desert pearl fishing." + +"That's a good one." Jimmy's chuckle expanded into a series. "But you +ain't the only one. There's Bob Flick, for instance, as you discovered +last night." + +The smile went out of Hanson's eyes, his face set. He ceased to lounge +against the bar and involuntarily straightened himself: + +"What about Bob Flick?" he asked. + +"Lots about Bob." Jimmy's tone was equable, but he shot Hanson a quick +glance. "He was our faro dealer for a while, but he's interested in +mines now. He's dead sure. Come to think of it, he's a lot of dead +things," he mused; "but don't ever confuse him with a dead one." Delight +at his own wit expressed itself in mirthful chuckles. "He's dead game, +and he's a dead shot, two important things for a man that's playing to +win when in certain localities, and he's dead certain that he's the +God-appointed guardeen of the Black Pearl." + +"What's she got to say about it?" growled Hanson. + +The bar-keeper shrugged his shoulders. "Ask me what the desert out +there's thinking, and I'll tell you what's going on inside the Pearl's +head. Say," animatedly, "I told you to ask me about those emeralds last +night, didn't I?" + +The manager laughed shortly. "I saw 'em close, son, after I left you. I +know stones. Square cut emeralds. Lord! They sure cost some good man his +pile, and he was no piker, either." + +"Bob Flick," said Jimmy, with a glow of local pride. "Kind of thank +offering, when the Pearl found him in the desert after he'd been lost +three days. Bob was new to this country then and reckless, like a +tenderfoot is, and the first thing he did was to go and get lost. Well, +they had several searching parties looking for him, but the Pearl, she +got on her horse and went after him alone, and, by George! she found +him, lying about gone in a dry arroyo. + +"Bob said he'd been wandering round crazy as a loon, seeing three big +lions with eyes like coals of fire stalking him night and day, and him +always trying to dodge 'em. He says at last they came nearer and nearer +until he stumbled and fell, and then he felt their hot breath on his +cheek, and he knew nothing more until he finally realized that some one +was trying to pour water down his throat and he kind of half come to +himself; and suddenly, he said, that awful gray desert, worse than any +hell a man ever feared, seemed all kind and tender like a mother, and +then, some way, it burst into bloom, and that bloom was the Black Pearl +bending over him. Oh, you ought to hear him tell it! Well--she got him +up on her horse and got him home, and her and her mother nursed him back +to health. And since that time Bob ain't never felt the same about the +desert. You couldn't drive him away now. + +"When he was well enough to travel, he went to 'Frisco and ordered a +jeweler there to get him the handsomest string of matched emeralds that +money could buy. The fellow was a year matching them, had to make two +trips to the other side. They do say," Jimmy lowered his voice +cautiously, "that Bob's father was a rich man and left him a nice little +fortune, and that he blew every cent of it in on those stones. The +Pearl certainly likes jewels. All the rings and things that she wears +were given her by the boys." + +"Umm-m-hum. Great story!" he nodded perfunctorily. "Guess I'll take a +walk." He strolled toward the door. + +"Bet I know which way you're going," chuckled Jimmy, as he disappeared. + +The unspoken surmise was perfectly correct. Hanson took his way slowly +and with apparent abstraction in the direction of the Gallito home, and +it was not until he was at the very gate that he paused and looked up +with a start of well simulated surprise. + +The house stood beyond a garden of brilliant flowers, and in the shadow +of the long porch--a porch facing the desert and not the mountains--sat +Pearl, swinging back and forth in a rocking chair and talking +impartially to the blind boy, who sat on the step beneath her, and a +gorgeous crimson and green parrot, which walked back and forth in its +pigeon-toed fashion on the arm of her chair, muttering, occasionally +screaming, and sometimes inclining its head to be scratched. + +"Good morning," called Hanson in his blithest, most assured fashion. +"Can I come in?" + +"Sure," drawled the Pearl. "Hughie and I were just waiting for company, +weren't we, Hughie?" + +The boy tossed his head impatiently, but made no answer. From the moment +Hanson had spoken he had assumed an air of immobile and concentrated +attention, tense as that of an Indian listening and sighting in a +forest, or of a highly trained dog on guard. + +"Take you at your word," laughed Hanson, and swung up the path, a big, +dominant presence, as vital as the morning. "Howdy," he shook hands with +Pearl and then turned to the boy, but Hugh drew quickly away from that +extended hand, quite as if he saw it before him. + +Hanson raised his eyebrows in involuntary surprise, but his good humor +was unabated. "What's the good word with Hughie?" he asked genially. "I +can't call you anything else, because I don't know your last name." + +"My name is Hugh Braddock," said the boy coldly. + +Again Hanson lifted his brows, this time humorously, as at a child's +unexpected rebuff, and looked at Pearl, and again he experienced a +feeling of surprise, for she was gazing at Hugh with a puzzled frown, +which held a faint touch of apprehension. + +"Then," Hanson looked from one to the other, but spoke to Pearl, "you +ain't brother and sister?" + +"No," said Pearl, and it disturbed Hanson more than he would have +dreamed to notice the change in voice and manner. The warm, provocative, +inherent coquetry was gone from both smile and eyes; instead of a soft, +alluring girl ready to play with him a baffling, blood-stirring game of +flirtation, she was again the sphynx of last night, whose unrevealing +eyes seemed to have looked out over the desert for centuries, until its +infinite heart was as an open page to her, and she repressed in the +scarlet curves of her mouth its eternal, secret enigma. + +"We are brother and sister." Hugh edged along the step until he could +lay his head against Pearl's knee. "But we're not blood relations, if +you're curious to know." The insolence of his tone was barely veiled. +"My mother was a circus woman that Mrs. Gallito knew. She deserted me +when I was a baby, and Mrs. Gallito has been all the mother I ever had +or wanted, and Pearl the only sister. I was born blind." + +"Oh, Hughie," remonstrated Pearl, "you've got no call to say that. He +don't see with his eyes," she turned to Hanson, "but I never saw anybody +that could see so much." + +"How's that?" asked Hanson easily. He was used from long experience to +the temperamental, emotional people of the stage, and he had no +intention of being daunted by any moods these two might exhibit. + +"Hughie, what color are Mr. Hanson's clothes?" asked Pearl. + +Still with a petulant, disdainful expression, the boy leaned forward and +ran his long, slender fingers with their cushioned tips over Hanson's +coat. "Brown," he replied indifferently. + +"He can tell you the color of every flower in the garden, just by +touching them," explained Pearl. "He knows all the different kinds of +birds just by the whirr of their wings. He can tell the color of every +dress I wear. He--" + +But Hugh had risen. "I don't like you to tell strangers about me," he +cried with passionate petulance, "and you know it. I'm going to find +mother." + +"Well, tell her that Mr. Hanson's here," called Pearl after him, +unaffected by his outburst. "He hasn't taken a shine to you," she +remarked frankly to Hanson. + +Again he was disturbed to notice that she seemed to give this obvious +fact some weight. She had rested her chin on her hand and was gazing +meditatively at the gay garden. A shadow of disappointment was on her +face, and more than a touch of it in her voice. + +"That don't bother me," affirmed Hanson confidently. "All that I'm +caring about is whether some one else shares his opinion." His bold, gay +eyes looked straight into hers. + +"I wonder who?" drawled Pearl. The gleam of her eyes shining through +narrowed lids and black, tangled lashes flicked him like the tang of a +whip. "Maybe you mean Lolita?" + +The parrot, which had perched on her shoulder and was tweaking her ear, +now hearing its name, looked up, fluttered its wings, and called out in +a gruff, masculine voice: "Mi jasmin, Pearl. Mi corazon." + +"He's talking for me, sure," said Hanson, who knew enough Spanish to +make out. + +"Oh, damn," said the parrot disgustedly; "why the hell can't you shut +up?" + +Hanson gave a great burst of laughter. "Lolita and Hughie are well +matched when it comes to politeness." + +"They got the artistic temperament, and me, too, and mom, also," said +Pearl. "That's what the newspaper boys always wrote about me when I was +on the road." + +The manager did not miss the opening. "Look here," he said earnestly; +"ain't you tired loafing around here? I guess you know what I'm in +Paloma for. I've made no secret of it. Now all you got to do is to show +me your contract with Sweeney and I'll double what he gave you, play you +over a bigger circuit, and advertise you, so's before your contract with +me's expired you'll be asked to do a few turns on the Metropolitan Opera +stage of New York City, New York." + +"Love me to-day," sang Lolita, meltingly, if with grating harshness. + +"That's right, Lolita, sing your pretty song," coaxed Pearl. "Come on, +I'll sing with you." She lifted her languorous eyes and sang softly, +almost under her breath, but straight at Hanson: + + "Love me to-day, + Love me an hour; + Love is a flower, + Fading alway." + +The blood surged to his temples at the direct challenge, he half rose +and leaned toward her. Then, as she laughed at him, he sat down. "Treble +Sweeney's offer, by God!" he said hoarsely. "Cash down beforehand." He +brought his fist down on the arm of the chair with a crash. + +"Oh, I ain't ready to make any plans yet," Pearl announced +indifferently. "I want to talk things over with Pop first. He'll be down +from the mines before long, maybe to-day." + +She sat for a few moments in silence, her eyes fixed on the far purple +hazes of the desert. "Oh, I wish there weren't so many of me," she said +at last and wistfully. "After I'm 'out' a while, I'll get to longing so +for the desert that I'm likely to raise any kind of a row and break any +old contract just to get here. I can't breathe. I feel as if everything, +buildings and people and all, were crowding me so's if I didn't have a +place to stand; and then, after I'm here a while, I got to see the +footlights, I got to hear them clapping, I got to dance for the big +crowds. Oh, Lord! life's awful funny, always trying to chain you up to +one thing or another. But I won't be tied. I got to be free, and I will +be free." She threw out her arms with a passionate gesture. + +"You'd be free with me," he cried. + +But, if she heard him, she gave no indication of having done so. "Can +you ride?" she asked presently. + +"You bet," said Hanson eagerly. "I was born in Kaintucky. Just tell me +where I can get a horse here, and--" + +"I'll lend you one of mine, and we'll have some rides. I'll take you out +on the desert. It ain't safe to go alone. You see those sand hills +yonder? Do you think you could walk out to them and back?" + +"Sure," said Hanson confidently and looking at her in some surprise. + +Pearl laughed. "Oh, Lolita!" she cried; "a tenderfoot is sure funny. The +chances are, Mr. Hanson, that if you started to walk around those dunes +you'd never get back. Goodness! ain't that mirage pretty?" + +The desert, which had lain vast, dun-colored and unbroken before their +eyes, had vanished; instead, a sapphire sea sparkled in the sunshine, +its white-capped waves breaking upon the beach. Upon one side of it +spread a city with white domes and fairy towers, and palm trees +uplifting their graceful fronds among them. + +Hanson rubbed his eyes and looked again. It was the first time that he +had ever seen one of these miracles of illusion, and he became so +absorbed in it that he failed to notice that some one else had entered +the gate and was making a leisurely progress toward the house. + +It was Bob Flick, and Rudolf Hanson could not repress a slight scowl at +this unexpected appearance of one whom he was constrained to regard as +more or less of an enemy, and certainly this morning as a blot upon the +landscape. + +Without a smile, but politely enough, Flick greeted him, after speaking +to Pearl, who looked at the newcomer with a sort of resigned +resentfulness. Lolita, however, made up what was lacking in cordiality. +With a loud squawk of welcome she flew to Flick's shoulder, uttering +gutteral and incoherent expressions doubtless meant to convey +endearment. + +"Call Mom, Bob," commanded Pearl lazily, and Flick obediently stepped +inside of the door in search of Mrs. Gallito. She must have been near at +hand, for she and Flick emerged before the manager could do more than +give Pearl a glance of eloquent disappointment, which she returned with +teasing mockery. + +Mrs. Gallito had evidently been making a toilet, and it is to be +regretted for her own sake that she might not have reserved all of her +appearances for the evening, for this brilliant desert sunshine was +pitiless in revealing those artificial aids with which she strove to +recreate and hold her vanished youth and bloom. + +Bob Flick she evidently regarded as a matter of course, but at the sight +of Hanson she showed unmistakable pleasure. + +"Hughie told me you were here," she said, sitting down beside him and +patting somewhat anxiously the mass of canary-colored puffs on the back +of her head; "and I been hurrying to get out before you got away." + +"I wouldn't have thought of going before you came," Hanson assured her. +She smiled and bridled a little, evidently well pleased. + +"Has Pearl told you that her Pop'll probably be down to-day?" she leaned +across Hanson to speak to Flick. + +"No, is that so?" he asked in his smooth, pleasant tones. + +"Where are the mines that Mr. Gallito is interested in?" asked Hanson, +determined to keep in the conversation. + +"Up in Colina." It was Mrs. Gallito that spoke. + +An up-darting gleam of suddenly aroused interest and curiosity flashed +for a moment in Bob Flick's eyes. Was it possible that at the mention of +that name Hanson had started and that something which might have been +taken for the shadow of dismay had overfallen his face? + +"Fine mining camp," Flick commented. "You know it at all, Mr. Hanson?" + +Hanson had scratched a match to light his cigarette, but now he lifted +his eyes and looked across its tiny flare straight at Flick. "No," he +said indifferently, "never was in it in my life." + +His tone and manner were both open and convincing, and yet the ruddy +color, as Flick noticed with merciless satisfaction, had not returned to +his face. + +"He's an awful queer man," confided Mrs. Gallito in a low voice to +Hanson. "I suppose," with a sigh, "it's the Spanish of him. Just think," +she spoke as one who has never overcome an unmitigated wonder, "born in +the sawdust same as me; his folks from way back all in the business, and +him with no use for it. Never rested till he got away from it. Why, he +didn't even want me to train Pearl, but," and here triumph rang in her +tones, "he couldn't help that. She took to it like a duck takes to +water. Always ready for it, never cried or complained at the long +hours." + +"She's sure got cause to be grateful to you." Hanson spoke sincerely. + +"I wouldn't have known what else to do with a child," said Mrs. Gallito +simply. "I always saw them trained that way. But her Pop didn't stand +for it." + +During this conversation Pearl and Flick had risen and, with Lolita +still on Flick's shoulder, had sauntered down through the garden. + +Seeing this, Rudolf, with his customary philosophy, made the best of the +situation. "Well," with rather vague gallantry, "I don't see how he can +stay away from a home like this." + +"It's the Spanish of him." This was Mrs. Gallito's explanation of all +the eccentricities in which her husband might indulge. "And," with +unwonted optimism, "maybe it's a blessing, too, 'cause he's awful queer. +And, anyway, he's what they call a man's man. Why, you might think he +lived all by himself up there in Colina; but he don't. He's got more old +Spaniards around"--she raised her eyes--"and they're the awfullest! +Cut-throats and pirates, I call 'em. They come up from the coast. And +it's funny, too," she exclaimed in a sort of querulous wonder, "because +Gallito's awful respectable himself." + +"That is queer, isn't it?" His tone was politely interested, but his +errant glance strayed to where Pearl and Flick stood gazing over the +vast spaces of the desert, flooded with illimitable sunshine. + +But Mrs. Gallito needed only a modicum of interest upon which to launch +her confidences. "Yes, he certainly is queer, and Pearl's like him in +lots of ways. Neither of them can stand anything holding them. They're +always wanting to be free, and they both got the strongest wills." + +"And does he ever bring his cut-throat friends here?" asked Hanson. + +"My, no!" cried Mrs. Gallito. "It wouldn't be safe." + +"I should think it would be as safe here as in the mountains." + +"He don't keep 'em there long, if they're wanted bad," whispered Mrs. +Gallito. "He knows more than one secret trail over the mountains." + +Hanson was beginning to show a more genuine interest now and, spurred on +by this flattering appreciation of her revelations, Mrs. Gallito went +on. + +"If you won't ever tell," she bent toward him after glancing about her +cautiously, "I'll tell you something. Of course, I'd never mention it if +I didn't feel that you're as safe as a church and one of our very best +friends." + +"You haven't got a better in the world," he fervently assured her, his +curiosity really aroused now. + +"Well," glowing with the importance of her news, "did you ever hear of +Crop-eared José?" + +It was with difficulty that Hanson repressed a long, low whistle. "I +should say," he answered. "He's been wanted by the police of several +States for some time, and since that last big robbery they've had +sheriffs and their parties scouring the mountains." + +For once Mrs. Gallito really had a piece of news which was sure to +command the most flattering attention. + +Crop-eared José was a famous and slippery bandit, and his latest exploit +had been the robbery of an express car and subsequent vanishing with a +sum approximating thirty thousand dollars. It was supposed that he had +jumped the train while it was making its slow progress across the +mountains at night and had lain on the top of the car until what he +regarded as the proper moment for action had arrived. He had then +slipped down, forced the lock on the door, held up both messengers, +making one tie and gag the other, under his direction, and then himself +performed that office for the first with his own skillful hands. After +that, to open the safe, take the money and drop from the train was mere +child's play to so accomplished a professional as José. + +"Gallito's got him." Mrs. Gallito enjoyed to the full the sensation she +had created, and then a sudden revulsion of fright shook her. "But, for +goodness' sake, Mr. Hanson, don't let on I told you. I--I wish I hadn't +spoke," she whispered. + +"Trust me," comfortingly. "Now don't give it another thought. I'll +forget it on the spot, if you say so." + +"Gallito'd kill me"--she still shook and looked at him fearfully. + +"Oh, come now," his tone was infinitely reassuring, "forget it; I have +already. Such things don't interest me." + + "Love me to-day, + Love me an hour;" + +sang Lolita, and his eyes turned to the two at the gate, still +chaperoned by the faithful parrot. In them was a flash like fire on +steel, as they rested on Bob Flick. Then he turned again to Mrs. +Gallito. "Forget it," he said again, as he rose to take his leave; "and +believe that I have, too." + +But his musings on his way back to the hotel would certainly not have +proved calming to that lady could she have but known them. + +"Gosh!" he muttered, "and I thought it had broke, this blessed blind +luck of mine, when I heard 'em mention Colina; but it's holding after +all, it's holding. I guess what I know now about the whereabouts of +Crop-eared José just about offsets anything Pop Gallito may know about +me and anything that Mr. Bob Flick can discover." + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Pearl's father came the next day, an older man than Hanson had imagined +and of a different type. There was no smack of the circus ring about +him, no swagger of the footlights; nor any hint of the emotional, gay +temperament supposed to be the inheritance of southern blood. He was a +saturnine, gnarled old Spaniard with lean jaws and beetling brows. His +skin was like parchment. It clung to his bones and fell in heavy +wrinkles in the hollows of his cheeks and about his mouth; and his dark +eyes, fierce as a wild hawk's, were as brilliant and piercing as in +youth. + +Little resemblance between him, gaunt and stark and seamed as a desert +rock, and his tropical blossom of a daughter, and yet, indubitably, +Pearl was the child of her father. The secretiveness, the concentrated +will, the unfettered individuality of spirit, which protected its own +defiant isolation at all costs, the subtlety, the ability to seek +sanctuary in indefinitely maintained silence, these were their traits in +common. + +Hanson, Gallito met with grave and impersonal courtesy which, the former +was relieved to feel, held a real indifference. There were many moths +ever circling about this glowing flame of a daughter. Gallito accepted +that, met them, observed them, and assumed those introspective +meditations in which he seemed ever absorbed. + +There was evidently an understanding between Pearl and himself, but no +show of affection, and what small tenderness of nature the Spaniard +possessed appeared to be bestowed upon Hugh. + +Grim and silent, sipping a little cognac from a glass on a table by his +side, the old man would sit on the porch for an hour at a time listening +to the boy playing the piano in the room within. + +Flick and himself also seemed on fair terms of friendship and would hold +apparently endless discussions concerning various mining properties. It +was understood that Gallito had come down now to give his opinion on +some claim that Flick had recently staked, and they two, usually +accompanied by Hughie, would ride off over the desert and be gone two or +three days at a time. + +Hanson, finding that the theatrical tie, "we be brothers of one blood," +had not that potency for Mr. Gallito that it exercised for his wife, and +that it was not for him as for her the open sesame to confidence and +friendship, speedily ceased to strike this note and approached him on +the ground of pure business. The offer he had made to Pearl he repeated +to her father. + +And Gallito had gazed out over the desert and considered the matter with +due deliberation. "Sweeney's been writing to me considerable," he said +at last. "He's made a good deal better proposition that he did last +year." + +"I told your daughter I'd double any offer Sweeney made," Hanson said, +and then expatiated on the advantage of the wider circuit and increased +advertising that he proposed to give. + +Gallito nodded without comment. Again he seemed to turn the matter over +in his mind. "I'll write to Sweeney," he said finally, "and get him to +give me a statement in writing of just what he proposes to do, a +complete outline of his plans down." + +The manager could not restrain the question which rose to his lips: "But +your daughter, is she willing that you should make all these +arrangements?" + +Gallito looked at him sharply from under his beetling brows. There was +surprise in his glance and a touch of cynical scorn: "She knows that I +look out for her interests." + +Another query crossed Hanson's mind, one he had no disposition to voice. +Was the understanding between father and daughter, and this apparent and +most uncharacteristic submission to his judgment on her part, based on a +common passion, acquisitiveness? He thought of Pearl's jewels. More than +once he had seen her lift her fingers and caress the gems on her hand, +just as the Spaniard sat and shook his buttons and nuggets of gold +together, pouring them from one palm to another, his frowning gaze fixed +on the ground before him. + +"Yes, I'll write to Sweeney," continued Gallito. "It'll take a few days, +though, before I can get his answer." He looked at the other man +questioningly. "It might be a week in all. I don't want to keep you +here that time. I could write you." + +"Nothing to do just now," said Rudolf easily. "Left things in good +hands, business running easily. Came down here to stay a while, needed a +vacation. And, Lord! This air makes a man feel like he never wanted to +leave." + +To this Gallito made no comment and, as there was nothing further to +say, the subject was, for the time, dropped between them. + +Hanson had made known his reasons, obvious reasons, for his presence in +Paloma, so, as he would have expressed it, he let it go at that and left +the observer to draw any conclusions he pleased as to his almost +constant presence at the Gallito home, and yet, after all, his visits +were only a little more frequent than those of a number of others, and +no more so at all than those of Bob Flick. + +There were long evenings when Hughie played the piano, and when Pearl, +now and then, touched the guitar, when Mrs. Gallito indulged in her +querulous monotonous reminiscences, while Gallito and various men sat +and smoked cigarettes about the card table; but always, no matter who +came or went, there was Flick, silent, impassive, polite, but, as Hanson +realized with growing irritation, ever watchful. + +Gallito sat down to his cards in the evening as regularly as he went to +bed exactly at twelve o'clock; and not cards alone. When he came +"inside" there were brought forth from various nooks of obscurity in his +dwelling other gambling devices, among them a faro layout, a keno +goose, and a roulette wheel. + +Undoubtedly, the play ran high in the Gallito cabin, but although Hanson +sometimes sat in at this or that game, more often he sat talking to +Pearl in the soft shadow of the porch. To her he made no secret of his +infatuation, but it seemed to him that when with her they were ever more +constantly and more irritatingly interrupted. Either Mrs. Gallito, or +Hughie, or some of the visitors would join them and Hanson realized that +his opportunities for speech with Pearl were becoming increasingly rare. + +The only times when he could really see her alone were on the occasions +of some morning rides together, which they had begun to take. + +As for her, she was still repelling, still alluring, still drawing him +on, but how much of it was a game which she played both by nature and +practice with consummate skill, or how much he might have caught her +fancy or touched her heart, he had no way of determining, and this +tormented him and yet daily, hourly, heightened his infatuation. + +And he was still further goaded by the knowledge that he was, in a +measure, under surveillance, which he was sure was instituted by Gallito +and Flick and connived at by Hughie; a watchfulness so subtle that it +convinced him even while he doubted. He felt often as if he were stalked +by some stealthy and implacable animal. This situation, imaginary or +real, began to affect his nerves and he would undoubtedly have left had +it not been for his mounting passion for Pearl, a passion fanned always +to a more ardent flame by her tantalizing coquetries. + +Then, too, he felt that, although Bob Flick and Gallito had probably +acquired some information about himself which he would gladly have +withheld, still they did not hold all the winning cards. The ace of +trumps, as he exultantly told himself, is bound to take any trick, and +the ace of trumps he felt that he possessed in the information which +Mrs. Gallito had so obligingly furnished him. In other words, his ace +was Crop-eared José, and his ace was not destined to be unsupported by +other trump cards. + +Only the evening before, he and Mrs. Gallito had sat alone for a few +moments on the porch gazing out over the wonder and glory of the desert +flooded in moonlight, and the patient, flattering interest with which he +invariably received her confidences had gained its reward, for she had +leaned toward him and whispered with many cautious backward glances: + +"He's up there in the mountains yet." + +"Who?" asked Hanson, attempting to conceal his eagerness under an air of +mystification. + +"Crop-eared José," she answered, "and Gallito's going to keep him there +for several months yet." + +"Is he?" and again Hanson strove to speak with disarming indifference. +"How do you know?" + +"I heard him and Bob Flick planning it," she answered. "They don't think +it's safe to try and get him out of the country now." Then, having +delivered herself of her burden of important news, she suffered one of +her quick revulsions of fright, and clapped her hand to her mouth and +turned white. + +"Oh, Lordy!" she cried. "Lordy! Ain't I the leaky vessel, though! Oh, +say, Mr. Hanson," she clutched his arm like a terrified child, "promise +me you won't give me away." + +"Sure," soothingly. "Why, Mrs. Gallito, you got to believe that +everything that you tell me just goes in one ear and out of the other. +But look here, just to take your mind off of this, I wish you'd do me a +little favor." + +"'Deed I will," she fervently assured him. "What is it?" + +"Why, Miss Pearl and I are going riding to-morrow morning, and I +particularly want to talk business to her. You know how anxious I am to +get her signed up. Well, I wish you'd manage to keep Hughie from butting +in as usual?" + +"Is that all?" she cried. "'Course I'll keep Hughie at home. I didn't +realize how he was tagging round after you and Pearl. I want him to help +me, anyway. We got to patch up my chicken house and yard so's to keep +the coyotes out some way or other." + +True to her word, she kept Hugh so busily employed the next morning that +to Hanson's infinite relief he and Pearl were able to ride off alone. + +"I'm going to take you to a palm grove to-day," said Pearl, as they +started off. + +She was in the gayest of humors, and for a time she bantered and +coquetted with him with an unrestrained and childlike enjoyment in her +mood, taking his ardent lovemaking as a matter of course; but, +gradually, as they rode, she became more quiet and fell into silence, +the Sphynx expression appearing on her face. + +Suddenly she leaned forward in her saddle and looked at him. There was a +hint of laughter in her glance, and yet behind it a certain serious +scrutiny. + +"I'm wondering a lot about you, do you know it?" she drawled softly. + +"Turn about's fair play, then, honey," he answered. "You keep me +guessing all the time. But what is it now?" + +She did not answer him immediately, but rode on in silence as if +cogitating whether or no she would reply to his question, and in some +way he received the impression that it was not the first time she had +mentally debated the matter. But finally she decided to speak, and again +she turned in her saddle and regarded him with that piercing scrutiny +which reminded him uncomfortably of her father. + +"Say," she began, with apparent irrelevance, "what you been doing, +anyway?" + +"Me!" cried Hanson. "You know. Been falling in love with you as hard as +I could, and"--his voice ringing with a passionate sincerity--"that's +God's truth, Pearl." + +She looked up at him, her wild eyes melting, her delicately cut lips +upcurling in a smile; then her head drooped, her whole body expressed a +soft yielding. + +Hanson grew white, almost he stretched out his arms as if to clasp her, +when she threw up her head with a low laugh, a tinkle of mockery +through it, like the jangled strings of her guitar. + +"But I mean it," she insisted, and now he saw that she had something +really on her mind, something she had determined to say to him. "Listen +to me," imperiously, "and stop looking at me as if you were looking +through me and still didn't see me." + +"I'm seeing your eyes, Pearl," he muttered, "and they drown me. And I'm +seeing your lips and they draw me like a magnet does a needle; but if +they drew me through hell, I'd go." + +"Listen," she spoke more imperiously than before. "Have you noticed how +Pop's been watching you--looking slantwise out of the corners of his +eyes whenever you come around." + +"I sure have," replied Hanson, "being as I'm not blind. But what of it? +I supposed he treated every one that came around you like that." + +"No," she shook her head thoughtfully. "I been studying over it, but I +can't quite make it out. Pop don't pay much attention to men that ain't +his kind, and you're not. And Bob Flick is always jealous, of course, +but he doesn't usually take it out watching folks like a ferret does a +rat hole. No, it isn't that." + +"Well, what do you put it down to?" Rudolf tried to speak easily. + +Pearl paid no particular heed to this question. "And it's not all +Hughie," she mused. "Of course," and here he saw an expression of real +regret, almost worry, on her face, "of course it's bad for all of us +when Hughie takes a dislike to any one." + +Hanson's sense of injury was inflamed. "But why the devil," he cried, +"should Hughie's unreasoning cranks count with commonsense people? I +can't understand," with wondering impatience, "why you all act like you +do about that boy!" + +"We've all learned that Hughie knows things that we don't know." + +"Umph!" the exclamation was disgustedly incredulous. "And so, simply +because Hughie chooses to take a dislike to me, I'm to be watched like a +criminal and treated, even by you, with suspicion." + +"No," she said, "I've been studying over it, but I can't quite make it +out. Pop don't pay much attention, usually. But," she spoke slowly, "I +thought maybe you'd tell me this morning." + +"Well, there's nothing to tell," he affirmed obstinately. + +She looked out over the desert for a moment. "Bob Flick hit the trail +last night," she spoke casually. + +"To go where?" + +"I don't know. I wish I did. But I kind of feel, I can't help but feel, +that it had something to do with you, and I wanted to tell you, to let +you know, so that you can clear out if you've a mind to." + +"I've no cause to clear out," said Hanson. "Gee!" his bold eyes looked +gaily into hers, "you all seem determined to make me out bad, don't you? +But if that's your way of trying to get rid of me, it don't go. When you +tell me that you won't sign up with me, and are going back to Sweeney, +for just half of what I offer you, then I'll know that you want to get +rid of me, and I'll clear out." + +"But I ain't told you that yet," the corners of Pearl's mouth were +dimpling. + +"No, and, by George, until you do I stay right here." + +"Look!" she cried with a change in her voice. They had entered a cañon, +where palms grew and involuntarily they drew up their horses to gaze at +the sight before them. The stately, exotic palms lifted their shining +green fronds to the blue, intense, illimitable sky, flooded with the +gold of sunshine, and beyond them was the background of the mountains, +their dark wooded slopes climbing upward until they reached the white, +dazzling peaks of snow. + +The sharp and apparently impossible contrasts, the magic illusions of +color made it a land of remote enchantment, even to the most +unimaginative. And to Hanson the world outside became as unreal as a +dream that is past. Here was beauty, and the wide, free spaces of +nature, where every law of man seemed puny, ineffectual and void. In +this unbounded, uncharted freedom the shackles of conventionality fell +from him. Here was life and here was love. He was a primitive man, and +here, before him in visible form, stood the world's desire. Barriers +there were none. A man and woman, both as vital as the morning, and love +between them. The craving heart of the eternal man rose up in Hanson, +imperatively urging him to claim his own. + +He drew his hand across his brow almost dazedly. "Whew!" he muttered, +"I kind of remember when I was a kid that my mother used to tell me +about the Garden of Eden. I thought it was a pipe dream, but, George! +it's true--it's true, and I can't quite believe it." + +The Pearl stood leaning against a great palm tree. She seemed hardly to +hear him. Her eyes were on the waving, shimmering horizon line of the +desert. Her face held a sort of wistful dreaming. + +"'The Garden of Eden!'" she repeated. "I've heard of it, too. It was a +place where you were always happy, but"--still wistfully--"I haven't +found that place yet." She turned her vaguely troubled eyes on him and +then sighed and drooped against the tree. + +"You can have things as you please, if you'll come to me." His speech +was rapid, hard-breathing; it was as if he hardly knew what he was +saying, but was talking merely to relieve the tension. "I'm boss and I +can manage that you shall dance when you please, and come back here for +a little breathing spell whenever you want. But," with an impatient +gesture, "I ain't here to talk business. That's what I came to Paloma +for--business. That's all I was before I met you, just a cold, hard +business proposition. I guess I was pretty hard-headed. They seemed to +think so in my line, anyway. I thought I knew it all." He gave a short +laugh. "I'm not so young. I thought I knew life pretty well--had kind of +wore it out, in fact. I thought I'd loved more than one woman; but I +know now that I've never loved, never lived before, that I've just woke +up, here in this Garden of Eden. + +"Pearl," the beads of sweat stood out on his brow, "I ain't made you +out. I know you're one thing one hour and another the next. I'm no vain +boy. I can't tell whether you've been drawing me on one minute and +holding me back the next just because you got to annex the scalp of +every man your sweet eyes fall on. That's all right, honey, I ain't +blaming you; but there's been moments lately, Pearl, when I've thought +that maybe you might care, moments when I been plumb crazy with joy. You +ain't let 'em last very long, honey," with a strained smile, "but they +most made up for the black question mark that came after 'em." He drew +out his handkerchief and wiped his wet brow with a trembling hand. + +She threw back her head and smiled into his eyes through her narrowed +lids. She held out her hands to him; and with one step Hanson lifted her +clear off the ground, gathering her up in his arms, holding her against +his heart and kissing her scarlet mouth. + +And she wound her arms about his neck and returned those kisses. + +"Put me down," she said at last, and Hanson did so, although he still +held her close to his heart with one arm. + +"Pearl!" he cried aloud, and it was like some strong affirmation of +life. He lifted his eyes, bold and unafraid, as an eagle's, to the +sun-flooded, brazen, blue heavens. Time stood still. He had drunk at a +new fountain--love, and, although his thirst was still unquenched, he +was eternal youth. The heart of life breathed through him. He looked +upon the sky, a man unconquered, unbeaten, undaunted by life. He was +its master. Did she ask the snow peaks yonder? He would gather them as +footstools for her little feet. Was it gold she desired? It should be as +dust for her hands to scatter to the winds. Was it name, place, state, +she asked? They should be plucked forthwith from a supine world and +offered her as a nosegay. + +Again, confidently now, he stooped and kissed her lips. It seemed to him +that roses and stars fell about them. "You love me, Pearl," he had +cried, in incredulous joy, "you love me." + +For answer she smiled sweetly, ardently into his eyes: "'Love me +to-day,'" she sang, nestling close to his heart. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +It was almost a week before Bob Flick returned, and during that time +Pearl saw Hanson almost constantly, although to do so she had +continually to match her quickness and subtlety against that of her +father and Hughie; but even while she and her father met each other with +move and counter-move, check and checkmate, it was characteristic of +both of them that Hanson's obvious infatuation and her equally obvious +return of it were never mentioned between them. + +With Hughie it was different, and Pearl met his petulant remonstrance, +his boyish withdrawal of the usual confiding intimacy which existed +between them, with laughter and caresses. As for Mrs. Gallito, she alone +was unchanged, apparently quite oblivious to storm conditions in the +mental atmosphere. But this was not unusual; when matters of importance +were transacted in the Gallito household Mrs. Gallito did not count. + +But these disturbing conditions could not daunt Pearl's high spirits; +she was like flame, and the light of her eye, the glow on her cheek, the +buoyancy of her step were not all due to the ardor of her loving and the +joy of being ardently loved. There was also the zest of intrigue. + +And, oh! what a mad and splendid game she and Hanson played together! +He rose to her every soaring audacity; they took almost impossible +chances as lightly as a hunter takes a hurdle. The lift of her eyelash, +an imperceptibly significant gesture, a casual word spoken in +conversation, these Hanson met with an incredible quickness of +understanding. It was a game at which he was master, and which he had +played many times before, but never had his intuitions been so keen, his +always rapid comprehension been so stimulated. + +Beneath the eye of another master of intrigue, Gallito, watchful as a +spider, they met and loved until, it seemed to Hanson, that the whole, +wide desert rang with their glorious laughter. And through it all +Francisco Gallito sat and smoked and sipped his cognac imperturbably; +apparently unruffled by defeat, a defeat--the Pearl with subtle +femininity saw to that--which was not without its elements of ignominy. + +But now Bob Flick had returned and had sat late with Gallito the night +before, talking, although Mrs. Gallito, who tendered this information to +her daughter, had not been able to overhear any part of their +conversation, in spite of her truly persistent efforts to do so. These +circumstances, and results which would probably ensue when a definite +course of action had been decided upon, occupied the Pearl's thoughts as +she stood at the gate gazing out on the gray wastes spread before her in +the broad morning sunshine. Lolita was perched on the fence beside her, +swaying back and forth, muttering to herself and occasionally dipping +down perilously in a curious effort to see the garden upside down +through the fence palings. + +Pearl turned at last from her contemplation of the subject which +absorbed her attention, and smiled as her glance fell upon the gaudy +tail, the only part of Lolita now visible, although, even then, the +horse-shoe frown, which showed faintly on her smooth forehead, a +facsimile of the one graven deep on her father's wrinkled brow, did not +disappear. + +"They've got it in for us, Lolita--Rudolf and me." She laughed outright +now. Pearl's laughter was ever a disagreeable surprise; low, harsh, +unpleasantly vibrant, and in strange dissonance to her soft, contralto +voice. "Lay you any odds you say, Lolita, that it's poor old Bob that's +got to be the goat." + +The parrot swung back to a normal position with surprising rapidity. +"Bob, Bob," she croaked. "Mi jasmin, Pearl, mi corazon," and she gazed +at her mistress with wrinkled, cynical eyes. + +"Yes, Bob's got to do the telling." Pearl confided more to Lolita than +she ever did in her fellow beings. "Oh, Rudolf, this is where you get +knifed! They've been laying for you right from the first. When Bob's got +to do a thing, he never wastes any time; he'll be along sure this +morning. I guess we'll just wait right here and catch him." + +Lolita hopped clumsily on to Pearl's shoulder and tweaked her ear. "Hell +and damnation!" she muttered, and then sang: + + "Love me to-day, + Love me an hour." + +Pearl shrugged impatiently. "Shut up!" she cried, and resting her chin +in her cupped hands gazed over the sparkling, shimmering plain, where +all unshadowed day-beams seemed to gather as pure light and then, as if +fused in some magic alembic, became color. There, the ineffable command: +"Let there be light!" included all. It is only in the silence and light +of the desert that men may fully realize that the universe is one, that +light is music and music is color and color is fragrance, +undifferentiated in the eternal harmony of beauty. + +Pearl's eyes drank the desert, unconsciously seeking there in its +haunting enigmas and unsolved mysteries an answer to the enigma of self. +Like life, like truth, like love, like all realities viewed from the +angle of human vision, the desert is a paradox. Its vast emptiness is +more than full; its unashamed sterility is but the simile for unmeasured +fecundity. + +For an hour thus she leaned and gazed, Lolita restlessly walking back +and forth, singing and croaking, until, at last, as Pearl had predicted, +Bob Flick appeared, a fact not unheralded by Lolita's cries; but Pearl +did not alter her languid pose, nor even turn her head to greet him. She +was watching a whirling column of sand, polished and white as a colossal +marble pillar. + +"It's kind of early for them to begin, ain't it, Bob?" she remarked +casually. + +"Yes." He paused by the gate, leaning one arm on it, and in the swift +glance she cast at him from the corners of her eyes she could see that +his expressionless face looked worn, the lines about the mouth seemed +to have deepened and the eyes were heavy, as if he had not slept. + +Lolita had, as usual, perched upon his shoulder, and was murmuring in +his ear. + +"Say, Pearl," Flick spoke again after an interval of silence, "I wish +you'd take a walk with me. I--I got something on my mind that I want to +talk about." + +"All right," she acquiesced readily, the nicker of a smile about her +lips quickly suppressed. "I'll be ready in a minute, as soon as I get my +hat." + +They walked through the village, the great broken wall of the mountains +rising before them, deceptively near, and yet austerely remote, dazzling +snow domes and spires crowning the rock-buttressed slopes and appearing +sometimes to float, as unsubstantial clouds, in an atmosphere of all +commingling and contrasting blues and purples. Presently they turned +into a lane of mesquite trees. The growth of these trees was thick on +either side and the branches arched above their heads. They had stepped +in a footfall's space into a new world. It was one of those surprising, +almost unbelievable contrasts in which the desert abounds. + +A moment before they had gazed upon the mountains, spectacularly vivid +in the clear atmosphere, white peaks and azure skies, green foothills, +serrated with black shadows. Behind them the sun-flooded white glare of +the great, waste place and behold! all these vanished as they set their +feet in this garden inclosed, this bower as green and quiet as the lane +of a distant and far softer and more fertile country. + +Pearl never made any conventional attempts at conversation, and for a +time they walked in silence through those fairy aisles where the light +fell golden-green and the sun only filtered in tiny broken disks through +the delicate lace of the mesquite leaves. Then Flick spoke: + +"Pearl, I got something to say to you, and it's about the hardest thing +I ever tried to do, because I know," his mouth twisted a little, "that +you're not going to like me any better for it." + +"What do you do it for then, Bob?" she asked, and there was more than a +half impatient mockery in her tone, there was wonder. + +"I got to," he said doggedly. "I guess there's no sense in it, but, +whether you like it or not, I always got to do what seems the best thing +for you." + +It was an inflexible attitude, an ideal of conduct unfalteringly held, +and uncompromisingly adhered to, and she knew it. Therefore, she +shrugged her shoulders resignedly, the faint horse-shoe frown again +appearing in her forehead. "Well--go on, then," her voice as resigned as +her shoulders, "and get it over." + +"It's this--" he hesitated and looked down at her a moment, and the +tenderness his glance expressed she did not lift her eyes to see and +would not have noticed if she had; "Pearl, Hanson ain't on the level." + +She laughed that slightly grating, almost unpleasant, laugh of hers. +"It's no secret to me, Bob, that several of you are thinking that." + +"We got cause to," he answered moodily; and then, as if struck by +something in her words, he looked at her quickly. "Has your Pop told you +anything?" There was surprise in both glance and voice. + +"Not a thing," she assured him, scornfully amused by the question, "but +there are some things that don't have to be told. Do you suppose I +haven't caught on to the way you've all been acting?" + +Again he looked his surprise. "We all been acting?" he repeated. + +"Yes. I've seen things and I've felt them. Oh, you might just as well +out with it, Bob. What is it all about?" + +He stared unseeing down the sun-sifted dusk of the green lane. Here the +desert silence was like a benediction of peace, broken now and then by +the faint, shrill note of an insect, or the occasional soft, mournful +plaint of a dove. + +"Pearl, you can laugh at me if you want to, and say I'm jealous. That's +true, I am. I can't help it; but this time it wasn't all that. I got to +size up men quick; that was my business for a good many years, and the +first minute I set eyes on Hanson I knew he wasn't straight. And then, +Hughie--" + +"And so you stirred up Pop to watch him?" she broke in quick as a flash. + +"No," he answered patiently, "no, but Hughie's feelings got so strong +about him that your Pop kind of woke up and got to studying him, and +then he saw what--what neither of you tried to hide," there was +bitterness in his tone, "and then he kind of remembered something he'd +heard up in Colina, and--" + +"And so you've been up to Colina tracking round after a woman." Her +verbal strokes were swift and hard as a flail. And again Flick started +in surprise. His cheeks flushed faintly, his jaw set. + +"What you mean, Pearl? Has he been having me trailed? I don't believe +it." + +"No," she drawled, taking a malicious amusement in this unwonted +perturbation on his part, "he hasn't. You slipped away so quiet and easy +that you didn't stop to say good-by, even to me. Were you afraid I'd put +him on to it?" + +She did not hesitate to plant her banderillos where they would sting +most, and Flick winced at this imputation which struck so near home. +"How did you know about the woman, then?" he asked quickly. + +Pearl lifted her head and laughed aloud, and, at the unwonted sound +breaking the desert silence, three pairs of brilliant eyes gazing +through the screening mesquite branches vanished and the gray, shadowy +figures of three coyotes disappeared as noiselessly as they had come. + +"How did I know about the woman?" She repeated the question and +considered it, still with amused scorn, as if debating whether she would +enlighten him or not. "Well--" drawling aggravatingly, "I knew you and +Pop had the knife ready for Ru--Mr. Hanson." Flick's mouth twisted +again. "That wasn't very hard to see. So when you hit the trail, Bob, I +gave him the chance to clear out. I did so, tipped him off, you know. +Now I guess if he'd been wanted bad for anything that would--well, put +him behind the bars, say, he'd have gotten out pretty quick. And, +anyway, if he'd been wanted like that he wouldn't have stayed here so +long, for they wouldn't have had any trouble in nailing a man as well +known as him before, so, you see, I knew it wasn't any of the usual +things. But," and here she stopped and, looking up into his face, spoke +more emphatically, "I gave him the chance, too, to tell me all about +himself and he didn't take it. Now, there isn't a man living that +wouldn't have taken it--under the circumstances--" she spoke with a +deliberately cruel emphasis, and Flick's shoulders contracted a little +as the dart pricked him--"unless it was some mix-up about a woman." + +"It's about a woman, all right," grimly. + +"What about her?" Pearl's voice cut the air like the swift, downward +stroke of a whip. + +"She's his wife," returned Flick. "She's been living up near Colina. She +owns a part of a mine there and has been managing it." + +Pearl took this in silence; and they had walked a dozen yards or so +before they spoke again. + +"Well, what of it?" she said at last, carelessly, almost gaily. +"Divorces are easy." + +His expressionless face showed a cynical amusement, with just a hint of +triumph in the lighting of his eye. He shook his head. "I talked to +her," he said. "She's a good, decent woman, but she ain't quite straight +in her head when it comes to Hanson. He lied to her right along about +the others, even from the first; played fast and loose with her, and +finally eloped with one of his burlesque head-liners. She took it. What +else was there for her to do? But she spends about all of her time +watching her fences to see that there's no divorce in question. He's +done everything, tried to buy her off more than once, but it's no good. +Every place he goes she follows him up sooner or later, and she writes +him letters, too, every once in so often, offering to come back to him. +And he can't get anything on her, for she lives as straight as a string. +Oh, no, Pearl, Mr. Rudolf Hanson'll never marry again as long as that +lady's living, or I miss my guess." + +It was evidently with difficulty that Pearl had controlled herself, her +brow had darkened and her upper lip had curled back from her white teeth +in a particularly unpleasant and disfiguring fashion. Again they walked +in one of those silences in which she was wont to entrench herself, and +then she looked up at him with a faintly scornful smile. "Well, you've +sure done your duty, Bob, and I guess you've got just about as much +thanks as folks usually do for that." + +He drew his hand across his brow and looked before him a little +drearily. "I didn't expect anything else," he said simply. "I knew what +I'd get. But whether you like it or not," and here he caught her +shoulder, his eyes holding hers, "as I told you before, I always got to +do what seems the best for you, no matter what's the cost." + +Her face did not soften. She merely accepted this as she did all else +that he had to give her, himself included. + +They had reached the end of a long alley, and now they turned and +retraced their steps, but they had traversed almost half of the distance +they had come before Pearl spoke again. "Well, now you've told me, what +else are you and Pop planning to do?" + +He weighed his answer for a few moments. "I guess nothing," he said at +last. "I guess we'll leave it to you to send him about his business." + +She stopped in the path and looked at him; her blue cotton gown fell in +long lines of grace about her slender figure. "If you and Pop want to +know what I'm going to do," she said, "I'll tell you. I'm going to +accept Rudolf's offer and go out on the road, that's what. You know by +this time that I can take care of myself." + +He pondered this seriously, but without a change in the expression of +his face. "Would you go with him," he asked, "if Sweeney offers you as +much or more money?" + +"Sweeney won't offer me more money. I know Sweeney and his limits," +significantly, "and you won't make up the balance of what Sweeney lacks, +either, do you hear? Now you, and Pop, too, can just keep your hands +off. I manage this affair myself." + +Flick merely shrugged his shoulders, and they walked on without further +speech on the matter. Presently Bob's keen eyes descried some one +walking down the mesquite avenue toward them. "Why, it's Hughie!" he +exclaimed. + +Even as he spoke the boy stopped and listened intently. He stood +motionless, waiting until they drew nearer, and then he lifted his head, +which he had bent sidewise the better to hear their almost soundless +footsteps. + +Pearl, seeing that her interview with Flick was soon to be interrupted, +stopped short in the path and laid one hand detainingly upon his arm. +"Bob," she said, in her softest tone, "Bob, you and I have been pals for +a good while; you aren't going against me now?" + +He stopped, obedient to her touch, and looked at her unwillingly. He +could always hold to his resolution in the face of her anger, but to +withstand her when she chose to coax! That was another and more +difficult matter. But if he met her gaze reluctantly there was no +wavering in either his glance or his voice. + +"I'm going to save you from Hanson, Pearl," he paused for the fraction +of a second, "by any means I got to use." + +She flashed one swift, violent glance of resentment, and then +immediately controlled herself, as she could always do when she chose +and when she was playing to win; so now she cast down her eyes and +sighed. + +The motes of the glancing sunbeams fell over her like a shower of gold, +spangling the blue cotton frock until it appeared a more regal vesture +than purple and ermine; her head was bent, her body drooped like a lily +in the noonday heat, her whole attitude was soft, and forlorn and +appealing, as if she, this wilful, untamed creature, subdued herself to +accept a wounding decree, and bore it with all the pathos of unmurmuring +resignation. + +Flick's heart smote him, he longed to clasp her to his breast and give +her everything she impossibly craved. And now it was he who sighed, and +then clinched his hands as if to steel his resolution. + +She heard the sigh: she saw from the quick movement of his hands, the +sudden, involuntary straightening of the shoulders that the struggle was +on, so she lifted her eyes half wistfully, half doubtingly to his and +thus gazed a moment and then smiled her faintly crooked heart-shattering +smile: + +"You and I have been friends too long for us to begin to quarrel now, +isn't that so, Bob?" Again she laid her hand on his arm. + +He caught it in both of his and pressed it hard. "I guess you know we'll +never quarrel, Pearl. I guess you know that, no matter what you say or +do, it'll never make any difference to me." + +"'Course I know it. And you're not going against me now, Bob, either, +are you?" She lifted his hand, and with one of her rare, caressing +gestures laid it against her cheek for a moment and, turning her face a +little, lightly brushed his palm with her lips. + +He shivered and quickly drew his hand away. There was silence between +them for a few moments and then he sighed again and more heavily than +ever. "Oh, Pearl," he cried, "what do you want to make things so hard +for? Let that dog--" he checked himself hastily, seeing her expression. +"I beg your pardon, you don't look at him that way. Let Hanson go. I +know you about as well as anybody in the world, don't I?" + +"Better," she nodded her head affirmatively, answering without +hesitation. + +"Well, won't you believe me when I tell you that you couldn't be happy +with him. Won't you listen to me, Pearl?" + +She looked at him a little slyly out of the corners of her eyes, a +little one-sided, cynical smile on her lips. "We're always so dead sure +what's going to make other people happy, ain't we, Bob? Always can see +what's good for them so much better than they ever can see for +themselves." + +Flick looked away from her, down the long, shaded alley; once or twice +he swallowed hard. "It ain't easy to say what I got to," a faint flush +on his cheek, "'cause I hate to talk that-a-way to a lady, especially to +you, Pearl; but I know you; and you can't be happy, you just naturally +can't, with a man that's married for keeps to one woman, and +that'll--God, Pearl! It hurts me to talk like this to you--that'll throw +you over when he's tired of you just like he's thrown over several +others." + +She caught his arm and shook it violently, as if she scarcely knew what +she did. "Throw me over! Me! the Black Pearl!" she cried hoarsely, and +broke into a torrent of Spanish oaths. "Dios!" she paused at last, +panting for breath, "you must be crazy to talk to me like that, Bob +Flick." + +"I told you how I hated it," he answered, with that sad, unaltered +patience with which he always took her unspared blame, "but I had to do +it. You got to know these things, Pearl, and it's better for me to tell +you than for your Pop to try." + +"He wouldn't have gotten very far," she muttered. + +"That's just it. You'd both have got to scrapping and screaming at each +other and nothing told." + +"Better nothing told, as far as you are concerned," she flashed at him +fiercely, and then lapsed into sullen silence. + +"Hello! Hello!" Hughie's voice came to them from a side avenue or +narrower path down which he had wandered. + +"Hello, yourself," Flick answered. "We'll wait for you right here." + +"Bob." Pearl's soft voice held no evidence of rancor. "Tell me something +quick, before he reaches us. Tell me true, and I'll be good friends, +honest, I will." + +"You know I'll tell you anything I can." + +"Then--then--is she--that woman in Colina--pretty? As pretty as I am?" + +He smiled bitterly. "No one's as pretty as you, Pearl. No, she ain't +pretty." + +"Well, what does she look like?" impatiently. + +"Nothing much. Why, I don't know, just looks like most every other woman +you see." + +"Oh, Bob, quick! Is she little or big? Is she kind of saucy and quick, +or is she quiet and slow? Quick, now, Hughie's almost here." + +"Why--why," he rubbed his hand across his brow, "she's kind of--kind of +motherly." + +Pearl threw back her head and laughed, then she took a few dancing steps +up and down the road. + +"It's Pearl and Bob," called Hughie. "I knew it a while back when I +stopped to listen, and then I heard a bird note down yonder," with a +wave of his hand toward the direction in which he had come, "and I +wanted to hear it closer, so I didn't wait for you. I can always tell +you two by the sound of your footsteps. Pearl walks in better rhythm +than you do, Bob." + +"Of course. What do you expect?" It was Flick who spoke. "What are you +doing so far away from home, anyway, Hughie?" + +The boy's wistful, delicate face clouded. "I had to go somewhere," he +said. "That Hanson has been there all morning, and mother has been +sitting with her head so close to his, talking, talking." + +Pearl laughed a single note, like her father's. "Poor Rudolf!" she +muttered, "the men are all jealous of him, even Hugh." + +Fortunately, the boy did not hear her, although Bob Flick did, as she +intended he should. + +"I do love mother," Hugh added plaintively, "but I can't love the people +she mostly likes, so I came as far away as I could, and here," his face +was irradiated in one of its quick changes, "I've been walking up and +down and hearing and seeing things; listening to the quail and the +doves; and a while ago there was a humming-bird; and did you ever smell +the desert as sweet as it is this morning?" He lifted his head and +sniffed ecstatically. "I've been turning the whole morning into music. +It's all gold and green and gay with little silver trumpets through it, +and now and again the moan of the doves. I'm going to work it out as +soon as we get home. That is," he shrugged his shoulders impatiently, +"if that Hanson has gone. He stops all the music and the color." This +was Hugh's invariable plaint when any one was about whom he disliked. + +"Oh, forget him," cried Pearl. "Don't be a cross, Hughie." She spoke +with a half impatient, half teasing tenderness. It was remarkable that +she showed no resentment toward the boy for the difficulties in which +she found herself entangled, although his intuitions and the almost +superstitious respect which they were accorded in the Gallito household +might be said to have caused the disturbing investigations into Hanson's +past. That Pearl herself disregarded these intuitions in this case was +to those about her the strongest proof of her infatuation; but she never +dreamed of blaming the boy or harboring rancor against him for this +mischief he had done. On the contrary, she accepted it fatalistically. +He never could account himself for these instinctive likes and dislikes +of his; therefore, they were to be accepted and borne with as something +of him, and yet apart from him; and that was all there was to it. + +"I'll tell you what to do, Hugh. You help me work out some new dances," +she cried. "A lot has been coming to me. One shall be 'Night on the +Desert.' We can get some great effects. Something really artistic for +the big cities, not the old waltz things we have to do for the desert +and mountain villages. We might try that 'Desert Morning' that you've +just been planning to compose, and I've been thinking of another one--a +Cactus Blossom Dance. Something like this." She began to dance. + +"Tell me the steps, Pearl; tell me the steps," called the boy +impatiently. "Oh, that's a great idea!" His face was flushed; and then +suddenly it fell. "Oh!" he cried despairingly to Flick, "she always gets +all sorts of ideas for new dances when she's in love--always. I never +knew it fail." + +He flung himself away pettishly, and started off alone. Hugh never had +any difficulty about direction. In a locality with which he was familiar +he would walk about with the utmost confidence. Occasionally he would +stop, rap his leg sharply with one hand, listen a moment, and then, +apparently satisfied, walk on. Those who pressed him for an explanation +of this merely received the vague and unilluminating reply that he could +feel the earth that way and tell from the sound of it, probably meaning +the vibration, just where he was. + +Pearl and Flick followed him in a more leisurely way, although no word +was spoken between them until they reached home. Pearl's eyes scanned +the house, but it was evident that Hanson had gone, for her mother sat +in a rocking-chair before the window, her head tilted back, fast asleep. + +"What do you suppose your Pop'll say to your signing up with Hanson?" +asked Flick, as they passed through the gate. + +"I suppose we'll have a row that'll make the house rock," she answered +indifferently, dismissing him with a nod. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +Hanson had learned of Flick's return to Paloma almost as soon as the +Pearl, although from a different source; Jimmy, the bar-keeper, having +informed him of the fact. He had sauntered into Chickasaw Pete's place +as was his wont, soon after breakfast on the same morning that Pearl had +walked in the mesquite alleys with Flick. This he selected as the most +agreeable place in which he could while away the time until a suitable +hour for either seeking Pearl, or else hastening to keep an appointment +with her. And Jimmy, with the same instinct that a squirrel hides nuts, +hoarded such chance bits of gossip as came his way and brought them out +one by one for the delectation of those with whom he conversed. + +"Hello, Paloma Morning Journal!" called Hanson as he entered the door, +his large, genial presence radiating optimism and good cheer. "How many +big black headlines this morning?" + +Jimmy's smile made creases in his round, red cheeks above his white +linen jacket. "Pretty shy of headlines," he chuckled. "Nothing but a few +personals." + +"No murders, no lynchings, nor merry cowboys on bucking broncos shooting +up the town?" exclaimed Hanson, in affected dismay. "My! My! What is +the West coming to? I'm afraid you ain't serving them the right kind of +poison, Jimmy." + +"It's so bad I won't touch it myself." Jimmy defended himself with +professional pride. "Have some?" + +"Not I. I got to be going, anyway." + +Seeing that Hanson was about to follow this intention, Jimmy drew forth +his first nut. "Bob Flick got back last night," he said, and then, +abashed by the meagerness of this bit of information, attempted to +enhance its value. "I'd like to know," leaning his elbow on the bar and +his chin in his hand, "I'd like to know where he went and what he went +for." + +Hanson did not alter his lounging pose and yet, indefinably, his +attitude became more tense, as if, in a quick riveting of attention, +every sense had become alert. "He's doing a good mining business, ain't +he?" he spoke carelessly. "I should think there would be a good many +things that would take him out of Paloma." + +"Oh, 'course," conceded Jimmy, "but don't you know how you kind of feel +things sometimes. Well, you listen to me, there's something queer about +this trip." He half closed his eyes and shook his head mysteriously. + +"Come, now, Jimmy," Hanson's tone was bantering; he rapped on the bar in +playful emphasis, but there was anxiety in his glance. "You're just +trying to work up a little excitement. A show down now, a show down." + +"Kid me all you please," chuckled Jimmy, with imperturbable good humor, +"but, take it from me, something special's been doing. Bob's not one to +talk about his or any one's else business, but if he's going off on any +little trip he's likely to mention it. And, when he comes back, he'll +tell you this or that he's seen or heard, just like other folks. But +this time, not a word. Glum as an oyster. You just bet," Jimmy +emphasized the statement with a series of nods, "that somethin's going +on. Him and Gallito have had their heads too close. And that old fox is +usually up to some mischief." + +"What kind?" asked Hanson quickly. + +"I don't know," answered Jimmy, and Hanson saw to his relief that the +bar-keeper was sincere, and that he was to his own manifest regret as +ignorant as he appeared. "But," he added shrewdly, "you been taking up a +good deal of the Pearl's time and attention, and Bob ain't going to +stand that from anybody very long." + +"He ain't, ain't he?" the insolence of Hanson's tone was touched with +triumph. + +"No," said Jimmy simply, "he ain't; and so I kind of feel that this trip +of his had something to do with you. And, say, Mr. Hanson," there was a +touch of embarrassment in his voice, "you and me's been pretty good +friends since you been here, and I thought I'd just give you the tip." + +Hanson did not answer for a second, and then he looked up with one of +his most open and genial smiles. "Thanks, Jimmy," he said heartily. +"Always glad to get the straight tip. I've been so anxious since I've +been here to sign up with the Black Pearl that maybe, considering Mr. +Bob Flick, I haven't been very discreet in the way I've been chasing +there." He leaned his elbow on the bar and assumed a more confidential +manner. "But, say, it's funny the way every one speaks the same about +Gallito. Hints everywhere, but no facts. What is it about him, anyway?" +He either could not or did not conceal that he awaited a reply with +eagerness. + +"I wish I knew." Jimmy spoke with the utmost sincerity. "Folks whisper +and shake their heads, but there's nothing to lay a finger on. I've +tried to pump Mrs. Gallito more than once, but if she knows anything she +keeps it dark. She's afraid of me, anyway. She always says: 'Oh, Jimmy, +you're such a gossip!' Me!" He was really injured. "I guess if everybody +did as little gossiping as I do this world would be a heap sight better +place." + +"Sure," agreed Hanson cordially; and this time his smile was genuinely +expressive of his thankful and undisguised relief. By what seemed to him +an almost incredible piece of good luck, considering the mutual +predilection of Mrs. Gallito and Jimmy for gossip, his secret was still +intact. + +He straightened up involuntarily, and stood a moment deep in thought, +his unseeing gaze fixed on a row of bottles on a shelf behind Jimmy. He +picked up an apple which Jimmy had left on the bar and turned it around +in his hands, apparently considering the effect of its scarlet stripes +on a green surface. Then he threw back his shoulders and laughed aloud. +"Bill Jones left a peckful of luscious apples in ye editorial sanctum +to-day," he said gaily. "Come again, Bill," and laying the fruit down, +turned away, Jimmy's delighted chuckles following him to the door and +beyond. + +Outside, he hesitated a moment, and then turned in the direction of the +little railroad station. Seeing him, the weedy youth who acted as agent +brought his chair, tilted back at an almost impossible angle, to the +earth, took his feet down from a table, laid aside an old and battered +magazine and expressed devout gratitude to heaven that any one should +relieve what he was pleased to term his solitary confinement. + +Hanson took the chair pushed toward him and for nearly an hour discussed +events in the outside world, and the various phases of his profession in +what the agent found a most entertaining manner. Finally he looked at +his watch, murmured something about an engagement and rose to go. +"Well," he said at parting, "I expect the next time I see you I'll be +buying a ticket." + +"Going to leave us soon?" asked the youth regretfully. + +"Not to-day," smiled the manager, "but soon. Oh, by the way, now I think +of it--is there a train goes straight from here to Colina?" + +"Not straight. You got to change twice; once at the junction and once at +the branch." + +"And what kind of a place is there to stay at? Any hotel?" + +"I don't know. Not much of one, I guess. Gallito would know. But he's +got his own cabin, ain't he? That's so. Why don't you ask Bob Flick? +He's just been up there. I sold him a ticket the other day, and he got +back on the train yesterday evening. Thanks," taking the cigar Hanson +offered. "So long." + +With his suspicions thus definitely confirmed, Hanson wasted no time in +following his inclinations and seeking the Pearl in her own home, but +his delay had cost him a word with her, and he did not arrive at the +Gallito house until after she and Bob Flick had left. This was the first +untoward event in a successful morning, but he concealed his chagrin +and, with his usual adaptability to circumstances, exerted himself to be +agreeable to Mrs. Gallito, not without hope of gaining more or less +valuable information. + +Mrs. Gallito was in one of her sighing moods. In spite of all the +methods of protection which she and Hughie had utilized the coyotes +still continued to commit their depredations upon her chicken yard and +daily to make way with her choicest "broilers" and "fryers." Also she +had shipped several large consignments of sweet potatoes to the eastern +markets and, instead of their being, as usual, snapped up by epicures at +enormous prices, they had fallen, through competition with other +shippers, almost to the price of the ordinary variety--desert sweet +potatoes, too. + +Life, she averred, was hard, almost a failure. Sometimes things went +sort of smooth and you thought it wasn't so bad, and then everything +went wrong. + +"Oh, not everything," said Hanson, with a rather perfunctory attempt at +consolation. + +"Yes, sir, everything"--dolefully she creaked back and forth in her +rocking-chair--"everything. Here's Gallito, the luckiest man at cards +ever was, and he's been losing steady for three nights, and he's getting +blacker and sourer and stiller every minute. Oh, if him and Pearl would +only talk when things go wrong with 'em. It would seem so natural +and--and--humanlike." + +"Back in the old sawdust days," she continued reminiscently, "when +things went wrong in the circus, everybody'd be screaming at each other, +calling names and threatening, and often as not throwing anything that +came handy. They'd get it all out of their systems that way, and there +was nothing left to curdle. But to sit and glower and think and think! +Oh, it's awful! Why, even Hughie, he'll talk and pound the piano like he +was going to break the poor thing to pieces; but this Spanish way of +Pearl and her father! Oh, my!" Mrs. Gallito shook her head and carefully +wiped a tear from her eye, before it could make a disfiguring rivulet +down the paint and powder on her cheek. + +"It can't be so much fun, all things considered," conceded Hanson. + +"Fun!" Mrs. Gallito merely looked at him. "When I think of what life +used to be! Lots of work, but just as much excitement. Why, I was awful +pretty, Mr. Hanson," a real flush rose on her faded cheek, "and I had +lots of admiration, 'deed I did." + +"You don't need to tell me that," said Hanson. "I guess I got eyes." + +"And when I married Gallito," she went on, "I was awful happy. I guess +I was soft, but I always wanted to love some one and be loved a whole +lot, and I thought that was what was going to happen, but it didn't. I +often wonder what he married me for. But," her voice was poignant with +wistfulness, "I would have liked to have been loved, I would." + +Hanson nodded understandingly and without speaking, this time, an +expression of real sympathy in his eyes. She was weak and silly. She was +dyed and painted and powdered almost to the point of being grotesque, +and yet, in voicing the universal longing, she became real, and human, +and touching. + +They sat in silence for a few moments, Hanson giving Mrs. Gallito an +opportunity to recover her self-control, while he devoted his attention +to Lolita, who had sidled up to him and was gazing at him evilly, ready +to nip him malevolently should he attempt the familiarity of scratching +her head. + +Mrs. Gallito, alive to the courtesies of the occasion, had succeeded in +choking back her sobs, and now she endeavored to turn the conversation +into less personal channels. "Bob Flick got back yesterday." + +"Where's he been traveling?" asked the manager easily. "He can't have +gone so very far, hasn't been gone long enough." + +Mrs. Gallito leaned forward carefully. "He's been to Colina and, Mr. +Hanson, I think his trip had something to do with you. Him and Gallito +talked late last night. I tried my best to hear what they were saying," +naïvely, "but I couldn't for a long while, and then Gallito said out +loud: 'Who's going to tell her, you or me?' + +"And Bob kind of waited a minute and then he said: 'Me. You'd only stir +her up and make her obstinate. But, God!' he said, sighing awful heavy, +'I wish I didn't have to.'" + +"I'll bet he does," muttered Hanson, and throwing back his head laughed +aloud. + +She looked at him doubtfully, as if surprised at his manner of receiving +her information. "Is it funny?" she asked. + +"Not for Bob," still vindictively amused. + +"I suppose something's gone wrong with her contract with Sweeney, and he +can hold her to it, or else have the law on her," ventured Mrs. Gallito. +"That's all I can think of to stir them up so." + +"I guess that must be it," agreed Hanson. "Eh, Lolita?" + +"Here comes Gallito now." She leaned forward suddenly, shielding her +eyes with her hand. "Yes, it's him, sure. Why, I thought he'd gone to +the mines and wouldn't be back to-day." + +Gallito was riding slowly toward the house, his head bent, his frowning +gaze fixed before him. Nevertheless, he had seen his wife's guest, and, +after taking his horse back to the stable, he made his appearance on the +porch. He shook hands with Hanson with his usual punctilious courtesy, +and then, turning to Mrs. Gallito, remarked without ceremony: + +"Mr. Hanson and I have business matters to discuss and you have duties +within; but first bring the small table, the cognac and some glasses." + +His wife wasted no time in doing his bidding, setting forth the articles +required with a timid and practiced celerity. But even after the brandy +had been tasted and praised by Hanson, and his appreciation of it +accepted with a grave Spanish bow by Gallito, the latter had made no +move to open the conversation, but had insisted upon his guest trying +his cigarettes and giving an opinion upon their merits. + +Again Hanson was complaisant, extolling them as worthy to accompany the +cognac, and after that a silence fell between them. Gallito sat puffing +his cigarette, watching with half closed eyes the smoke wreaths curl +upward, while Hanson waited patiently, smoking his cigarette in turn +with an admirable show of indifference. + +"The old fox!" thought he scornfully. "Does he hope to bluff me into +giving myself away?" + +Finally Gallito spoke, directly and to the point, surprising the other +man, in spite of himself, by a most unexpected lack of diplomatic +subterfuge and subtlety. + +"I received a letter from Sweeney yesterday," he drew it slowly from his +pocket, "and he doubles his offer to my daughter, making her salary, +practically, what you are willing to pay her. Now, Mr. Hanson, your +offer is very fine. I appreciate it; my daughter appreciates it; but she +cannot accept it. She treated Sweeney badly, very badly. She is an +untaught child, headstrong, wilful," his brow darkened, "but she must +learn that a contract is a contract." He took another sip of cognac. +"She will go back to Sweeney." + +He slightly shrugged his shoulders and spread out his hands as if to +say: "I deprecate this for your sake, but the question is definitely +settled; I beg you, therefore, to advance no useless counter-arguments." + +But Hanson ignored this unspoken request. "I'm sorry you feel that way +about it," he said, "but your daughter is of age. I guess I'll wait and +see what she has to say about this." He spoke pleasantly, almost +carelessly, no hint of a threat in his tone, at least. + +Gallito looked at him from under his brows in surprise, then he laughed, +one single, menacing note. "My daughter will say what I have said." + +"I'm not so sure," returned Hanson, and had some difficulty in +restraining himself from speaking violently. Then he forced the issue. + +"Look here, Gallito," he cried, "what's all this about, anyway? I came +down here to the desert anxious to secure the Black Pearl as a new +attraction for my vaudeville houses. I see her and I know that she's all +to the good. So, banking on my own judgment, I make her an offer that's +more than generous, just because I've the courage of my convictions and +am willing to back my enthusiasms. Sometimes I win, sometimes I lose," +he snapped his fingers lightly, "but I'm always ready to take the +chances. + +"Well--what happens? In the first place, instead of jumping at my offer, +like any sensible man would--I'm talking plain now, Gallito--you got to +drag Sweeney into the game, which, look at it any way you please, +wasn't particularly square. Pah!" scornfully, pitching his cigarette +with a single muscular sweep of the arm into the heart of the garden, +"you don't know it or you wouldn't have been talking to me like you +have, but I've got Sweeney pigeon-holed, know all his resources, and +know positively that he can't come up to my offer. I tell you what, +Gallito, it's cards on the table now, and," he tapped the table between +them with his knuckles, "I'm politely requesting you to draw your nigger +from the woodpile." + +Gallito's glance was like the stab of a poignard. "But this is strange +talk." He drew back haughtily. "I do not have to make explanations. I +have my daughter's interests at heart." + +"Yes, I know," interrupted Hanson, "but the black man, the black man. +Out with him." + +Gallito's face had grown livid, his mouth had tightened until it was +drawn and pinched. "Have it, then," he growled. "Sweeney's straight. +Sweeney hasn't left one wife in Colina while he eloped with one of his +head-liners. He's not in one scrape after another with a woman, until +he's a joke in the coast newspapers, and every woman he features in his +shows has got a black smirch on her--" + +"By God, you've got your nerve," cried Hanson violently, interrupting +him. + +Gallito made a deprecating motion with his hands, as if to say: "Don't +mention it, I beg of you," and then carefully selected another cigarette +from the box between them. "My nerve is something that rarely deserts +me, Mr. Hanson," he replied, "but I wish to finish what I was saying. +My daughter has a future. She will not only be a great dancer, but she +has the making of a great actress in her, too. And Dios!" he still +maintained his cold restraint, but now, in spite of himself, his tones +vibrated with passion, "just at the beginning of her career, to be made +cheap by you, or any like you--" + +He lifted his hooded hawk's eyes and looked at Hanson, who in turn +looked boldly back at him with something indefinable yet unmistakable, +something that was not only defiance, but also a threat in the blaze of +his angry eyes. + +And Gallito caught it and raised his brows ever so slightly, pondering +surprisedly for a moment, and then resolutely putting the matter aside +for the present. But Hanson continued to gaze across the table at him. + +"Read me my pedigree, ain't you?" he snarled. "All right. Now just let +me tell you something, Gallito. I take my answer from your daughter, and +from no one else. Understand?" + +"No," returned Gallito, "I do not understand." + +Hanson controlled himself with difficulty. For a moment it was on the +tip of his tongue to tell Gallito that the latter's connivance in the +escape of the notorious Crop-eared José was known to him; also, he was +perfectly cognizant of the present whereabouts of that much-desired +person, and that he, Hanson, had but to step to the telegraph office and +send a wire to Los Angeles, and not only José, but Gallito would be in +custody before night. An admirable method for securing Gallito's +consent to his daughter's acceptance of this professional engagement +which Hanson offered. But, carefully considered, it had its flaws, and +Hanson was not the man to overlook them. Indeed, he sat there in a +baffled and furious silence, going over them mentally and viewing them +from every possible angle. + +In the first place, it was extremely doubtful if, after communicating +his knowledge to Gallito, he would ever be permitted to reach the +telegraph station, and, in the second place, he would, he was convinced, +have not only Gallito, but the, to him, more formidable Bob Flick to +deal with. Therefore, and most reluctantly, he decided to keep his +information and his threats to himself for the present and, certainly, +until he was better able to enforce the latter. + +But, as he told himself, twisting his shoulders irritably, there was +something about this old Spaniard which got on his nerves. A quality of +composed patience, as if he, at least, never doubted the successful +outcome of his plans; a rock-like imperturbability against which +violence or vituperation shattered itself and fell harmless. + +"Look here, Gallito," again he adopted a conciliatory manner, leaning +his elbows on the table, as if prepared for a long discussion, after +first helping himself to another glass of cognac and a fresh cigarette, +"what's the use of a row, anyway? Now, why can't we come to some +agreement. What you say about your daughter's abilities is all true, +every word of it. That's the reason I'm so keen to get her. I know, and +I'm frank enough to confess it, that out here in the desert, with not +much to think about, on a vacation, and all, why--I kind of lost my head +about her. She's a beautiful woman, Gallito, no need to tell you that. +But you know, and I know, that a man can always shut down on that sort +of thing if he's got to. My reputation ain't what it ought to be, no one +knows that better than I, or feels it more; but, honest to God, Gallito, +I ain't as black as I've been painted. No man is, probably. Now, what I +got to say is this--" + +"No need to say it, Mr. Hanson," interrupted Gallito, who had been +twisting his mouth wryly during these remarks. + +Again Hanson concealed his rising anger, although the color rose in his +cheeks. "Now just let me talk a minute, Gallito." He spread out his +hands placatingly. "The proposition I'm going to make you is this: Miss +Gallito tells me that her mother traveled with her when she was younger, +and even now, when she can spare the time from her farming, she goes out +on the road with the young lady. Now, why not have a purely business +arrangement. Let Miss Pearl sign up with me, and then we'll coax her +mother to go with her. I should think that would satisfy you. It ought +to satisfy any one, for a girl's mother to go with her." + +"Of course," the Spaniard bowed with stately courtesy, but not before +had his smile been so sardonic. "As you say, every one should be +satisfied with such an arrangement and, let me say, it is one that would +greatly please me, but as I told you before, Mr. Hanson, it cannot be. +My daughter must keep her contract with Sweeney." + +At white heat, Hanson rose and pushed back his chair. "Hell!" he cried. +"What am I up against, anyway! Give some people the earth and it +wouldn't suit 'em. But you can take this from me, Gallito," he leaned +forward and pounded his fist on the table, "I don't take my answer from +you. We'll see what the Black Pearl has got to say. The Black Pearl +smirched by going out with me!" He laughed aloud. + +He fell back frightened as Gallito half rose from his chair, and then, +to his unbounded surprise, the Spaniard sat down again and softly rubbed +his hands together. Hanson had a fleeting and most disturbing impression +of the old man gloating over some secret and pleasant prospect. + +Lolita had balanced herself on the edge of the table and Gallito bent +forward and scratched her head, making little clucking noises in his +throat the while: "Our guest is a great poker player, Lolita, he +understands how to make a bluff, but," again that single grating note of +a laugh, "assure him, my Lolita, that he will be cold-decked." + +Again Hanson was almost betrayed into making his threat then and there. +He leaned forward and shook his forefinger under the Spaniard's eyes, +his face was purple, but just in time he remembered himself, closed his +mouth and drew back. + +"Bob, Bob," croaked Lolita, "mi jasmin Pearl, mi corazon." + +"A most intelligent bird, you see, Mr. Hanson," observed Gallito, with +saturnine politeness. + +Hanson turned away impatiently. "I will see your daughter this +afternoon," he said. + +Gallito had begun to roll a fresh cigarette, but now, checking himself +abruptly, he threw a long comprehensive glance at the cloudless brazen +sky, and then, squinting his eyes, studied for a second or two the +equally brazen desert. + +"I think not, Mr. Hanson," he said, with assured finality in his voice. +"I do not think you will see my daughter to-day. What? Going so soon? +Another glass of cognac? No. Adios, then. Adios." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Hanson walked away, more disturbed in mind by his interview with Gallito +than he would have thought possible an hour or two earlier. Something in +the finality of the Spaniard's voice when making those last predictions, +his evidently sincere belief that his daughter would not appear under +Hanson's management, had impressed the latter in spite of himself, +causing him seriously to question the extent of his influence over +Pearl, a weakness which he had not previously permitted himself. + +He strove with all the force of his optimistic will to throw off the +depression which deepened with each moment, assuring himself that he was +tired, that all morning he had played a part, every faculty on the +alert; and that this growing dissatisfaction and unrest were only the +evidence of a natural reaction. + +He attempted to buttress his hope with mental argument, logical, even +final, but singularly unconvincing where Pearl was concerned, as +anything logical and final must ever be. He tried to recall in detail +stories he had heard of her avarice and her coquetries; he thought of +her jewels, her name, her wiles. Who was she to object to past +peccadillos on his part? Then, uncomforted, he sought to reassure +himself with the remembrance of her love for him, ardent and beautiful +as the sun on the desert, but her image rose on the dark of his mind +like a flame, veering and capricious, or as the wind, lingering, +caressing, yet ever fleeing. + +He was tormented by the remembrance also of strange phases of her which +he divined but could not analyze. Again, he would in fancy look deep +into her dark eyes, demanding that his imagination revive for him those +moments when his heart had thrilled to the liquid languor of her gaze, +and instead he saw only the world-weariness of that sphynx glance which +seemed to brood on uncounted centuries, and far back in her eyes, +illusive and brief as the faint, half seen shadow on a mirror, he +discerned mockery and disdain. + +He took off his hat, baring his brow to the air, and drew long breaths, +unpleasantly conscious of an increasing heaviness and sultriness in the +air, according well with the oppression of his thoughts. When he arrived +at the San Gorgonio, he was glad to take refuge in his room and there, +to relieve the tension of nerves strung almost unbearably high, he +walked back and forth and, after his fashion, swore volubly and +unintermittently. + +At last, having exhausted his vocabulary as well as his breath, he +turned to the window, struck by some impending change in the atmosphere +which had now revealed itself by a slight obscuring of the light in the +room. He looked out curiously, half fearfully, dimly but rebelliously +aware that the world, his human world of personal desires and +activities, as well as all external nature was threatened by vast, +unseen, menacing forces. The great, gray desert lay in crouching +stillness, a silence which filled the soul of man with horror. The sun, +crimson as blood, hung in a sky over which seemed to have been drawn a +veil of golden mist. + +"Must be something doing," muttered Hanson, and even as he spoke his eye +was taken by a movement on the horizon line, a billowing as if the +desert were rising like the sea. And truly it did. It lifted in waves +that mounted almost to the sky and swept forward with a savage eagerness +as if to bear down upon and engulf and obliterate the little oasis of a +village with its green productive fields, and reduce it again to the +wastes of desolation from which it had been so painfully redeemed by +man. + +For nearly three days the storm lasted, raging by day and by night. The +trees bowed to earth and lifted themselves to bow again with the sound +of many waters in their leaves; and in the voice of the wind every +savage, primeval menace alternated with every wail of human grief and +anguish which has echoed through the ages. All desolation in the heart +of man, "I am without refuge!" shrieked in its high cries, and, as if +failing to find adequate expression in these, it summoned its chorus of +demons and rang with the despairing fury of all damned and discordant +things, until one bowed and covered the ears and muttered a prayer. + +And the sand! It sifted constantly through doors and windows, and seemed +to fall in a fine continuous shower from the very roof. It covered +everything with a white rime; it sifted into the hair, the eyes; +breathing was difficult, the air was so chokingly full of it. + +The rooms, too, were ever paced by the restless feet of the wind, +curtains swayed as if shaken by ghostly fingers; rugs and carpets rose +and fell upon the floor, and, whether one sat alone or with others, the +air seemed full of stealing presences, sad, and sometimes terrible; and +of immemorial whispers that would not be stilled. + +The desert knows no time, its past and present are one, a thousand years +is as a single day, and when it chooses to find its voice all yesterdays +and all to-morrows blend. + +Some day, when grief and horror shall be abandoned by man as utterly as +his dreams of cave-life; when his remembrances of wrestling with the +forces of nature or commerce shall seem as remote as his warfare with +beasts, and tribes as savage as beasts; when he lifts his dull eyes and +dares to dream only joy and beauty, then he will know that the gray +cries of the wind are but the emphasis to the singing of the sunlight, +that the black storm-clouds are but the contrast Beauty offers to deepen +and heighten the effect of her more ethereal hues, blue and rose and +pearl. + +Hanson had stood the storm badly; inactivity was always a hardship to +him, also he was unused to such discomfort as he had to endure; and his +depression and unrest induced by the suspense he suffered in +continually wondering how Pearl would take Bob Flick's news were +greatly increased by the fact that he could get no word to her, nor +receive any from her. + +But on the third night the storm stilled and in the morning the desert +showed herself sparkling like an enchantress, exhibiting all of her +marvelous illusions of color and wrapped in a golden garment of +sunshine. She smiled with all the allurement of a radiant and beautiful +woman. + +Early in the morning, just as Hanson was preparing to send a note to +Pearl, he received one from her, asking him to meet her again within an +hour or two, amid the palms. She did not suggest his riding thither with +her. The note was brief, a mere line, and, study it as he would, he +found nothing in it to indicate what her attitude was toward him, +therefore it did not allay his nervousness in the least as to how she +would meet him. But with the passage of the storm his nerves had +recovered their normal tone, and with the brilliance and freshness of +the morning much of his optimism had returned. + +He reached the approach to the foothills where the palms lifted their +stately and magnificent height, long before Pearl, and there, walking +restlessly back and forth, he watched the road with straining eyes. And +then he saw her, at first a mere speck in the distance; then she became +more and more distinct, for she rode fast. She waved her hand to him as +she came nearer and his heart rose in a great bound. Slackening the +speed of her horse, she leaped from the saddle while it was still going, +ran by its side, throwing the bridle over her arm, stopped, laughing +and breathless, and cast herself into Hanson's waiting arms. + +"Pearl, Pearl," he cried, in a low voice, holding her close against him +and kissing her upturned face again and again. "Oh, Pearl, it's been a +thousand years in hell since I saw you last." + +She laughed and, gazing eagerly into her care-free eyes and +unreproachful face, his heart rose again in a great sigh of relief. +"That's the way a tenderfoot always feels about a sand-storm," she said. +"Well, we sure gave you some nice theatrical effects, didn't we? It's +the biggest I've seen for many a long day. But you were bound to see +something like that before you went away." She spoke with a fatalism +approaching Bob Flick's. "The desert never lets you go and forget her." +Her eyes dreamed a moment. + +"She's like you in that, Pearl. My heavens! I wish you could see +yourself this morning. Beautiful ain't the word." + +"Am I beautiful, Rudolf?" She lifted her head from his shoulder and +looked at him with a soft, childlike expression, as if longing for his +praise. + +"I guess you know it," he said adoringly, stroking her shining black +hair, "but if you weren't, if you were as ugly as sin, it wouldn't make +any difference, you'd get us all just the same. All women like you got +to do is to look at a man and he'll follow you like a sheep. I don't +know what it is, magnetism or something." + +"But I'm glad I'm not as ugly as sin," she murmured, in smiling content. +"And I'm glad you're not, too." She reached up her arm and touched his +hair caressingly. "I love that little touch of reddish gold in your +hair, and, yes, just that sprinkling of gray, and I love your blue eyes. +I can't bear dark men. I am so dark myself." + +"You sure are, Pearl, thank the Lord! I never was very poetic, but I +never see one of these desert nights sparkling with their big stars, +twice as big as natural, that I don't think of you." + +She smiled, delighted at his praise. + +"But, goodness!" he went on, "when ain't I thinking of you? I tell you, +you been on my mind steady these last few days. Your Pop was so dead +sure when I talked to him that you'd have nothing more to do with me +that it got to worrying me, and I thought maybe you'd hold it against me +that I hadn't told you about--about my being already tied up." He +scanned her face as if fearful of seeing it cloud and change. + +It did. The laughter faded from her eyes, her brow darkened. "I wish you +had told me," she said, "then I'd been a little better prepared for Pop +and Bob; but I guess they got as good as they gave." + +"I know I ought to have told you, Pearl," he said miserably, "and I +meant to, honey, but"--gathering her more closely in his arms--"I just +couldn't spoil those first few days; and, anyway, you drove everything +but you out of my head. I just determined every time it came into my +mind to tell you, that I wasn't going to spoil Paradise with any +recollections of hell. Maybe I was all wrong, but that was the way I +felt." + +"No, you were all right, Rudolf," she wound her arms about his neck. +"When the storm came it broke swift and sudden like the sand storm, and +we didn't live it all over beforehand, getting ready for it, and +deciding how we'd meet it when it came, and all that. We just enjoyed +ourselves. Lived and loved up to the moment when it broke, and that was +the best way." + +"Gee! was there ever a woman like you!" lifting his glad, gay gaze to +the sky. "Why, Pearl, it most frightens me when I think how happy me and +you are going to be together." + +"Are we?" nestling closer to him. "How?" + +"How?" he repeated. "Why, we're going to be together first and last; +ain't that enough? It is for me. But"--with drooping head and affectedly +humble and dejected mien--"it couldn't be expected to be enough for you, +could it?" + +"Hardly," she looked up at him through her long lashes. + +"Well, since that ain't enough for you," still with affected +resignation, "let me tell you this: You're going to dance to bigger +crowds and higher class ones than you ever saw before, because you're +going to be advertised proper, see?" And then, sketching out plans with +his former bold, optimistic confidence, "We're going to travel on the +other side and travel in style, too, a big touring automobile. I guess +you can show those foreign managers something new in the dancing line. +How would you like to see your name all over London and Paris? The Black +Pearl! Eh?" + +She slipped away from him and took a few buoyant dancing steps. "Fine!" +she laughed. "It sure sounds good to me." Floating nearer to him, she +pinched his arm. "Ain't you the spellbinder!" + +He caught her with one arm. "Oh, Pearl," his voice falling to +seriousness, "you don't know how happy you make me. Honest, I've been so +plum scared these last few days, I been almost crazy. I didn't know, you +see, just how much influence your Pop and Flick might have over you, and +I got locoed for fear you wouldn't see me and give me a chance to +explain." + +"Pop and Bob Flick kindly took the bother of explaining things off your +shoulders, didn't they?" with a short, vindictive laugh. + +"Darn 'em," bitterly. "I don't want to say anything about your Pop, but +Flick's a sneaking coyote, and sooner or later he'll pay for snooping +into my business. Oh, I've cursed myself more than once for letting him +tell you, but I never loved a woman before, Pearl, and I couldn't take +the chances, honest I couldn't. I hadn't the nerve." There was a +passionate sincerity in his voice. + +"They've been telling me you've loved many a woman." Her eyes gloomed +and she slashed her skirt savagely with the riding crop she held. + +"You know," he whispered, "you know. I've been a fool. There have been +many others, Pearl, I ain't going to deceive you, but--there's never +been but one." + +She softened and smiled at him, then her face darkened again. "But +there's one that stands in the way--yet," she said gloomily. + +"In the way? What do you mean?" uncomprehendingly. + +"Why, that woman up in Colina? Don't she stand between you and me, now, +for a while?" + +"Not much, she don't," emphatically, "not her!" + +A light flared in Pearl's eyes. "I knew Pop and Bob were up to some of +their tricks! They been doing their best to ram it home that she'll die +before she lets you get a divorce." + +"You bet she will," muttered Hanson, with concentrated bitterness, and +stifled some maledictions under his breath. "I've tried every way, +turned every trick known to sharp lawyers for the last six years, trying +to get free; but she's got money, you see, and she can keep her eye on +me, so, in one way or another, she's balked me every time." + +Pearl threw herself from him and looked at him with wild eyes. "Then how +are you going to get free now?" she cried. "What are your plans? Why is +she going to come around now, if she never has before?" + +"She ain't, honey, the devil take her!" He caught her back in his arms +and held her as if he would never release her. "But what difference does +that make to us?" he pleaded ardently. "We're going to let the whole lot +of them go hang and live our lives as we choose." + +"Then Pop and Bob were right; and I never believed them, not for a +moment. I thought you were too smart to stay caught in a trap like that. +I thought you were so quick and keen to plan and were so full of ideas +that you could get around any situation." Again she flung herself away +from him and, with her face turned from him, stood looking out over the +desert. + +He bent toward her and, throwing his arms about her, again endeavored to +draw her back into his embrace, but she resisted. + +"Pearl," he cried roughly, "what do you mean? You don't mean to say that +you got any foolish ideas about it making any difference whether a +preacher says a few words over us or not? Why, you can't feel that way. +You've seen too much of life, and your folks have always been show +people. They didn't hold any such ideas. Anyway, you got brains to think +for yourself. What joke you playing on me, honey? Oh, don't hold me off +like that, lift your head and look at me. I know you're going to laugh +in about a minute and then I'll know it's all a joke." Again he tried to +put his arm about her and again she threw him off. + +"Let me alone," she cried harshly. "I'm thinking. Let me alone." + +"Pearl," he besought wildly; his face had suddenly grown flabby and +white, his voice was broken with his desperate pleading. "Honey, you +don't want time to think. Why, there's nothing to think about. We're +going off on the train this afternoon to be happy together, and we don't +give a cent for anything else. We'd be married if we could. My Lord! I +should say so! But since we can't, we'll make the best of it." + +He paused and looked at her, but there was something inflexible in her +attitude, some almost threatening aloofness that made him hesitate to +clasp her as he longed to do for fear he should meet another and final +rebuff. He waited a moment or two, but, as she did not speak, he began +again. + +"I know you're joking, Pearl, but it's awful hard on me"--he wiped the +sweat from his brow. "You haven't got any such fool ideas. Of course you +haven't. They're for dead ones, old maid country school teachers, and +preachers and things like that, hypocrites that have got to make their +living by playing the respectable game. But we're not that kind, Pearl, +we're alive, and we're not afraid. We're going to be happier than two +people ever were in this world. Pearl, speak to me. I don't wonder that +your mother complains about the way you shut yourself up and never say a +word. Speak to me. Tell me what you're thinking." + +"I'm thinking a lot of things," she answered, but without turning her +head to look at him, "and I ain't through yet. Now I've got to studying +on this matter, I'm a-going to think it out here and now." + +"But what is there to think about?" in a sort of exasperated despair. +"Oh, Pearl, how can you be so cruel! I know you ain't got any of the +fool ideas of the dead ones I was talking about. You couldn't have; not +with Isobel Montmorenci for a grandmother, and Queenie Madrew for a +mother, and the same kind on your Pop's side of the house. You didn't +have any Sunday-school bringing up and I know it. Then what you playing +with me like a cat does with a mouse for? It ain't fair, Pearl, it ain't +fair." + +She turned and faced him now with an impatient gesture of the hands. +Some expression on her face, the set of her mouth, the horse-shoe frown +on her forehead gave her a fleeting resemblance to her father, a +resemblance that momentarily chilled his blood. + +"For goodness' sake keep quiet a minute," she cried irritably. "You gave +me a jolt a while ago, telling me you couldn't get free, and I want a +minute or two to take it in." + +"But you don't think hard of me for that," he implored. "Oh, Pearl--" +but she had again turned to her contemplation of the desert, and +realizing that further speech might bring her swift anger upon him he +walked hastily away. + +Several yards from her he paused and again wiped his brow. "Oh, God!" he +muttered, lifting his face to the sky, "what does a man know about +women, anyway?" + +As for Pearl, she scarcely knew that he had ceased to speak to her. She +had been thinking, as she averred, thinking back over the years. She had +been dancing professionally ever since she had been a child. As a slim, +tall, young girl, still in skirts to her shoe tops, her mother had +traveled with her, and, although this evidence of chaperonage irked her, +she had with her quick intelligence early seen its value. All about her +she saw the struggling flotsam of feminine youth, living easily, +luxuriously to-day, careless of any less prosperous morrows, and, when +those swift, inevitable morrows came, she had seen the girlish, exotic +queens of an hour, haggard, stripped of their transient splendor, +uncomprehending, almost helpless. + +She saw readily enough that it was not only her superior talents and +training, the hard work and hard study which she gave to her profession +which set her above the butterflies and apart from them, but her +mother's constant presence during those early years was of almost equal +value. + +All this she realized at an age when strong impressions are indelibly +retained. Her value, the tremendous value of an unsmirched virtue, a +woman's greatest asset in a world of desire and barter, became to her a +possession she cherished above her jewels, above the money she could +earn and save and the greater sums she dreamed of earning or winning by +any means--all means but one. + +Her observations of the women about her who gave all for so little, her +meditations upon them, and the conclusions she drew from their maimed +lives only emphasized the resisting force of her nature. She was not +born to be a leaf in the current, whirled by the force of waters into a +safe haven or an engulfing whirlpool as chance might decide; she must +dominate the currents. + +And with the temptations of her youth, and her ardent emotional +temperament, would also come the remembrance of those haggard girls with +their pinched blue lips, the suffering in their eyes, their delicate +faces aged and yellowed and lined and spoiled, weeping with shaking +sobs, telling her pitiful stories, and begging her for money, for a word +with the management. And, when they had gone, she had turned to her +looking-glass and gazed at herself with conscious pride and delight. +Contempt, not pity, stirred her heart for the draggled butterflies whose +gauzy irridescence was but for a moment; and before her mirror she +constantly renewed her vows that never would she barter her bloom, her +freshness, her exquisite grace for what those girls had to show. + +She had seen a great French actress roll across the desert in her +private car, to meet in every city the adulation of thousands and it had +stimulated her ambition enormously. She was by nature as insatiable as +the horse-leech's daughter; she would take all--love, money, jewels in +return for her barren coquetries. The fact that she was "straight," as +she phrased it, gave her sufficient excuse for her arrogant domination. + +Unfortunately for Hanson, there was no particular temptation in what he +could offer in the way of professional advancement. She was perfectly +cognizant of her own ability, aware that its resources were scarcely +developed. Already her field widened continually. She was in perpetual +demand with her public, and therefore with her managers. + +But she loved Hanson. In all of the love affairs in which she had been +involved she had never really cared before, and now only her strong will +kept this attraction from proving overmastering. And here came the +struggle. The right or the wrong of the matter, the morals of it, did +not touch her. It was the clash of differing desires, a clash between +passion and this secret, long-cherished pride of virtue. + +"Honey, honey," he was back at her side again; his voice was hoarse and +ragged, but for that very reason it moved her. All at once the +primitive woman, loving, yielding, glad and proud to yield, stirred in +her, rose and dominated her hard ambition. She lifted her head a little +and, still with it turned from him, looked at the pagan glory of the +day. Her eyes closed with the delight of that moment. She felt her +resistance breaking down, the weakening and softening of her +resolutions. Was she at last to know the splendor of loving and giving? + +"Ain't you played with me long enough, Pearl?" his voice was in her ear, +a broken, husky whisper. "What's the use? Why, of course," grasping at +his usual self-confidence, "I'm a fool to get scared this way. You've +showed me that you care, you have, honey; and I guess," with a nervous +laugh, "the Black Pearl hasn't got any damn fool scruples such as I've +been frightening myself out of my skin by attributing to her." + +Imperceptibly, almost, her whole body stiffened. Her soft, relaxed, +yielding attitude was gone. But she remained silent, the same ominous, +brooding silence that the desert had held before the storm, had Hanson +but noticed. He did not. He was still pleading: "Why all the time you +been keeping me on the anxious seat, I been telling myself that the +Black Pearl--" + +"Yes, the Black Pearl," she interrupted him with her low, unpleasant +laugh. "Don't you care a little that I got that name, Rudolf?" + +"Care!" He wound his arms about her now and buried his face in the great +waves of her inky, shining hair, wildly kissing the nape of her neck; +but with a deft twist of her lithe body she slipped almost away from +him, although his arms still held her. "Care? Of course I care. But +what's that got to do with it when I love you like I do? Pearl, if you +were a good deal blacker than you're painted it wouldn't make any +difference to me." + +He strove to draw her nearer to him, but again she slipped away, this +time escaping the circle of his eager arms. For the first time her face +was turned toward him, but her eyes were cast down, her long lashes +sweeping her cheeks. "But I must be pretty bad to get called the Black +Pearl," she said in that same low voice; all of its sliding, drawling +inflections were gone; it was strangely tense. + +"I guess so, damn it!" he cried; "but I'm past caring, Pearl. I got a +hunger and thirst for you, honey, such as men die of out there in the +desert. Before God, I don't care anything about your past or your +present, if you'll only love me for a while." + +With that low, harsh laugh of hers that sounded in his ears afterward +like the first muttering menace of the sand wind over the desert, the +storm broke. Her eyes had an odd green glitter, her face was white, a +dusky white, and her upper lip was drawn back from her teeth at each +corner of the mouth. + +"You fool!" Her voice was a muffled scream. "Oh, you fool! Sweeney could +have told you better, any man on the desert could have told you better. +The Black Pearl! Why, I've been called the Black Pearl since I was a +baby, almost. It's my hair and my skin and my eyes." + +[Illustration: "'I'll show you what I'll do.'"] + +He didn't believe her, but he saw his blunder at once; cursed himself +for it, and, mad to retrieve himself, began incoherent explanations and +excuses. "Of course," he stammered, "of course, I--I--was just fooling, +you know. But, well, what does it matter, anyway? Oh, Pearl, girl! Don't +look at me like that. Don't!" + +"I'll do worse than look at you, if you come any nearer me," she +threatened. "Do you think I ride all over the desert where I've a mind +to without protection? I guess not." She lifted her skirt with a quick +movement and drew a long knife, keen as a stiletto, from her boot. + +Hanson went a little whiter, but he was no coward. "Come on then, finish +it for me," he said. "Your eyes are doing it anyway. Oh, Pearl!" he fell +again to desperate pleading, "you won't turn me down just for a +mistake?" + +"Me, the Black Pearl, held cheap!" she muttered and raised her stag-like +head superbly, "and by you! You that pick up women and drop them when +you're tired of them. Me, the Black Pearl." She turned quickly and ran +to her waiting horse, loosening the tether with quick, nervous fingers. +Hanson followed her. + +"Pearl, you ain't going to leave me?" + +But she was already in the saddle. + +He caught at her bridle and held her so. "Pearl, I made a mistake"--he +was talking wildly, rapidly--"but you ain't going to throw me down just +for that--you can't. Think how happy we've been this last week--think +how we've loved each other. Why, you can't turn me down, just for one +break, you can't." + +"Can't I?" she said, her teeth still showing in that unpleasant way. +"Can't I? Well--if you don't get out of my way I'll show you what I'll +do. Slash you across your lying face." Her arm was already uplifted, +riding crop in hand. "Let me go!" Her voice was so low that he hardly +heard it, but full of a thousand threats. Then, swerving her horse +quickly to one side, she jerked the bridle from his slack fingers and +was off across the desert. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +It was about an hour after Pearl had ridden away to meet Hanson among +the palms that Bob Flick joined Mr. Gallito, who sat, as usual, upon the +porch of his home, smoking innumerable cigarrettes. He was his composed +and imperturbable self, exhibiting outwardly, at least, no trace of +anxiety, but Flick looked worn, almost haggard. + +Gallito had just told him of Pearl's early departure and also of the +fact that she had left no word intimating when she might return or in +what direction she was riding; but when Flick expressed regret that this +had been permitted, he merely lifted his shaggy brows. "What is done is +done," he said. "She slipped away before either Hugh or myself knew that +she was gone, and what could we or you, for that matter, have done to +prevent her?" + +"I wish I'd been here," muttered Flick uneasily. "I'd have done +something." But his tone did not bear out the confidence of his words. + +"I am too old and, I hope, too wise," returned the Spaniard, "to attempt +to tame the whirlwind. But cheer up, my friend. Although she rode off to +meet this Hanson, without a doubt, still, the day is not over." + +"You know what she is when her head is set," murmured Flick. + +"I! Have I not cause?" exclaimed Gallito, a depth of meaning in his +tone. "Who so much? But, nevertheless, she has not gone for good. She +would not leave without some of her clothes, especially her dancing +dresses and slippers, if she went with him. And her jewels, oh, +certainly, not without her jewels!" he smiled wisely. "There are, as you +know, certain ornaments about which she has her superstitions; she will +not dance without her emeralds. Oh, no, console yourself, as I do. She +has not gone for good." + +But Flick was not so easily reassured. "I almost wish she had," he said +gloomily. "If she don't go to-day, she will to-morrow or next day." + +"In that case they will not go far," returned Gallito and rubbed his +hands. His reply had been quick and sharp as the beat of a hammer on an +anvil; but now he spoke more softly: "But will she go at all, my friend? +You, like myself, have ever played for high stakes. Then you know and I +know that this is a world where a man may never look ahead and calculate +and say, 'because there is this combination of circumstances, these +results will certainly follow,'" he emphasized his words by tapping on +the table with his long, gnarled forefinger. "The wise man never +predicts, because he is always aware of that interfering something which +we call the unexpected." He blew great wreaths of smoke from his mouth +and watched them float out on the sun-gilded air. "We know that my +daughter is as obstinate as a pig and as wilful as a burro, therefore we +conclude that she will follow her mad heart and go with this fellow. But +there we take no account of the unexpected, eh, Lolita!" welcoming the +parrot who waddled out of the open door and came clucking and muttering +across the porch toward the two men. + +Flick stirred uneasily. He was in no mood to stand Gallito's +philosophizing, and the Spaniard, seeing it, smiled as he scratched +Lolita's head. "Two people can not be thrown much together and not show +to each other what is in them," he continued. "You know that my daughter +is proud," he lifted his own head haughtily here, "and you know that +above everything her pride lies in the fact that no man can scorn her. +But this that Hanson does not believe." + +This roused Flick to a sudden interest, some light came into his heavy +eyes, a dull flush rose on his cheek. "What do you mean?" he asked. + +"This: Yesterday morning when that hound sat there and talked to me +there was something I said which made him forget himself in anger, and +he said: 'Me! The Black Pearl smirched by me!'" + +"He said that?" Flick's tones had never been more drawlingly soft, but +there was a quality in them, an electric and ominous vibration, which +boded ill for Hanson. + +Gallito nodded. "It is in his mind. It is his thought about her. If he +said it to me when he forgot himself he will surely say it to her." + +"And you let him say it, Gallito? You let him go away safe after saying +it?" Flick looked at him amazed. + +"I think far ahead," replied the older man. "It is the custom of a +lifetime. To act on the moment is to continually regret. Do you think I +want my daughter's tears and reproaches for the rest of my life? No, I +wish to spend my old age free of women and their mischief. This Hanson +must talk, talk, talk. Therefore, if you give him rope enough he will +hang himself before any woman's eyes." + +"But when?" asked Flick, and that vibration still lingered in his voice. +"I am not so patient as you, Gallito." + +The Spaniard made no reply to this and silence fell between them for a +few minutes. + +"Oh!" said Flick, as if suddenly remembering something, something in +which he was not particularly interested, but which would serve as a +topic of conversation during these tense moments of waiting; "Nitschkan +is up at Colina, and Mrs. Thomas." + +"Nitschkan!" A faintly humorous smile crept from Gallito's mouth up to +his eyes. + +He was genuinely interested if Flick was not. "What is she doing there?" + +"She came up to look after those prospects of hers, nurse them along a +little, I guess, and to hunt and fish some, I guess, particularly hunt +and fish. She says she's going to take a bear-skin or so back with her." + +"She sure will, if she says so," returned Gallito confidently. + +"Of course, she got wise to José right away." Flick spoke rather +anxiously. + +"Of course, being Nitschkan." Gallito's tone was quite composed and +equable. "Well, she's safe, and she'll keep him in order if anybody +can." Again that grimly humorous smile played about his mouth. "Why did +she bring Mrs. Thomas?" + +Flick laughed. "To keep her in order, too. Mrs. Thomas is big and +pretty, with no mind of her own, and she got tangled up in some fool +love affair that her friends didn't approve of, so when Nitschkan +started off on this last gipsy expedition of hers they sent Mrs. Thomas +with her." + +Gallito was about to answer and then, suddenly, he seemed to stiffen, +his hand, which was conveying a match to his cigarette, remained +motionless, the flame of the match flared up and then went out in a gust +of wind. "Look, Bob, look," he said, in a low voice. "What do you see +out there?" + +Flick's eyes, keener even than his, swept the desert. "By George!" he +whispered huskily; "it's her, her alone, and coming like the wind." + +"I hope," cried Gallito and gnawed his lip, "that she has done nothing +that will get us into trouble." + +"I hope to God she has," said Flick. "The desert'll take care that she +gets into no trouble. It'll be as silent as the grave. Just another case +of a reckless tenderfoot getting lost out there in the sand, that's +all." + +It was indeed Pearl, and, as Flick had said, coming like the wind. She +pulled her horse up as she neared the gate and, when she reached it, +stopped him abruptly, slipped down from the saddle, threw the bridle +over the fence paling and ran toward the two men on the porch. Her face +had changed but little since she had left Hanson among the palms. Even +her wild ride had failed to bring back its color, and the curl of her +upper lip still revealed her teeth. + +She stood for a moment before them, slashing her skirt with her riding +crop, then she cast it from her and sank down on the porch as if +suddenly exhausted. Bob Flick quickly poured out a glass of her father's +cognac and held it to her lips. She took a sip of it and it seemed to +revive her. + +"He thought that I," her voice was hoarse and labored, "he thought that +I was like those other women that he has picked up and got tired of and +left, Selma Le Grand, and Fanny Estrel, and others. I wonder where he +thinks that I've been living that I wouldn't know about them. Fanny +Estrel! I went to see her once in vaudeville, and, before I'd hardly got +my seat, someone next me began to whisper that she used to be one of +Hanson's head-liners and that he was crazy about her once. And there she +was, old, and fat and tired, playing in an ingénue sketch in a cheap +house!" She laughed harshly. "That's what he was offering me," with a +flare of passion, "and I was too green to know it!" + +"And he, where is he?" asked her father, speaking more quickly than was +his wont and eyeing her closely. + +"Out there, I suppose, I don't care. Oh, no," meeting his eye and +catching his unspoken question. "He's safe enough; don't worry." + +"Shall I make him shoot, Pearl?" asked Flick softly. "He won't have +much chance with me, you know. I'll get him in Pete's place and pick a +quarrel. He'll understand. You won't be in it." + +"No, you won't, Bob, although I can see how you're wanting to," she said +decisively. "The Black Pearl!" she broke out presently. "My name's an +awful good advertisement. It gives me a reputation for being worse than +I am." She laughed cynically. "But he believed it." Her whole face +darkened again. + +"He needn't go away believing it, Pearl." Once more Flick spoke softly, +persuasively, and once more her father looked at her hopefully. + +She looked quickly from one to the other as if about to accede, and +then, dropping her head on her arms crossed on her knees, she fell into +wild and tempestuous weeping. "No," she cried, "no, promise me you +won't, Bob. Oh, Oh, Oh!" she wailed and rocked back and forth. "What +shall I do? What shall I do?" + +At last she lifted her heavy eyes and looked at the two men. "I want to +go away from here, quick," she said, "quick." + +"With Sweeney," said her father, well pleased. + +"No." She threw out her hands as if putting the thought from her with +abhorrence. "No, I can't dance and I won't. I never want to dance again. +I never will dance again," passionately. + +"But that is a feeling which will soon pass away, my daughter," urged +her father. + +"No, no," she wailed. "And anyway, I would never be safe from Ru--from +him, that way. He would follow me about and try to meet me. He would. I +know he would." + +Gallito drew back and looked at her with uplifted head. "Afraid! You?" +he asked in surprise. + +"No," she flashed at him scornfully, lifting her head, but again she +dropped it brokenly on her arms. "I'm afraid of myself," she cried, +suffering causing her to break down those barriers of self-repression +which she usually erected between herself and everyone about her. "I'm +afraid of myself, because I love him. Yes, I do. I love him just as much +as ever--and I hate him, hate him, hate him." She hissed the words. Once +more she sobbed wildly and then she broke into speech again. "Oh, I want +to go somewhere and hide; somewhere where he'll never find me, where +I'll be safe from him." + +"What's the matter with Colina?" said Bob Flick suddenly. "He'll never +come there. A good reason why!" + +Pearl became perfectly still. It was evident that the suggestion had +reached her, and that she was thinking it over. Her father, too, +considered the matter. "Excellent," he cried; "excellent." + +And Pearl looked up eagerly. "But when can we go, when?" she cried and +stretched out an imploring hand to touch his knee. "To-morrow? No, +to-day. You said yesterday, father, that you would be going back at +once. Oh, to-day! The afternoon train--" She looked eagerly from one man +to another. + +"Yes, to-day," agreed Bob Flick. "You can go as well to-day as +to-morrow, Gallito." + +The Spaniard had been thinking with thrust-out jaw and narrowed eyes, +now he threw out his hands and lifted his brows. "Have it so, then," he +said. "The train leaves this afternoon. Go, Pearl, and pack your things. +I promised Hughie that he should go back with me, but he had better wait +a few days until his mother can get her sister to stay with her. You had +better tell him, Pearl." + +After she had gone into the house the two men sat in silence for a few +minutes and then Flick lifted his relieved face to the sky. "If there's +any God up there," he said, "I'm thanking him for that unexpected you +were talking about, Gallito." + +"Ah, that unexpected!" returned Gallito. "It is more comforting than +many religions. More than once when I have been in a tight place I have +relied on it and not vainly. You will go with us this afternoon, Bob?" + +Flick hesitated a moment. "I can't," he said. "I've got a lot to do at +the mines here, but I can come up soon if you think it will be all +right." + +The old man smiled in his most saturnine fashion and sighed dismally. "I +will make a special offering to the church if you come often," he said. +"I can see black days ahead of us. She does not like the mountains." + +"Oh, she'll not stay long," Flick consoled him. "The summer, perhaps; +but she will be ready to sign up with Sweeney before fall. She can't +stay off the stage longer than that. You'll see." + +Gallito sighed again and pessimistically shook his head. He was far +from anxious to assume the responsibility of restoring his daughter's +spirits, and had hoped that Flick would relieve him of that duty, but, +since that was not to be, he accepted the situation with what philosophy +and fortitude he could muster and hurried the feminine preparations for +departure so successfully that he and Pearl actually got away on the +afternoon train. + +This fact was communicated to Hanson by Jimmy early that evening. Hanson +had returned to the San Gorgonio before noon and had remained in his +room until nightfall. As the day wore on and he recovered in some +measure his self-control, he began to view the situation in a different +light from that in which it had first appeared to him, although, in +strict adherence to fact, he could not be said to have viewed it in any +light at all in that first hour or two. It was all dense darkness to +him, a black despair not unmingled with anger and a sense of injury. But +as he sat alone in his room with its windows looking out over the +desert, his naturally confident and optimistic spirit gradually asserted +itself. Again and again, and each time more positively, he assured +himself that all was not lost yet by any means. He had been unfortunate +enough, yes, and fool enough, to make a bad break; a break that he, with +all of his experience, should have known better than to make to any +woman. Yet he felt that, even admitting that, he could not justly blame +himself. The Pearl had not only surprised but frightened him by the way +she had taken a fact which he thought she fully understood--that +marriage was out of the question for him. He was so crazy about her +that he had lost his head, that was the long and short of the matter, +and had made a fool of himself and hash of the situation; but +temporarily, only temporarily. For, and to this belief he clung more and +more hopefully, the Pearl was too deeply in love with him definitely to +close the affair between them for just one break. He would not, could +not believe that. It was true enough that he had aroused her passionate +and violent anger, but the more violent the anger the sooner it will +evaporate, and strange and complex as the Pearl was, she was yet a +woman; and no woman on earth could long hold resentment against the man +she loved. She had, he was able to convince himself, regretted her mad +action in first threatening and then riding away from him long before +she had reached home; and, without doubt, it was only that high and +haughty pride of hers which kept her from returning to him before she +had traversed half the distance. But the course of action he had decided +upon was sure to win. He would give her a few hours to get over her +anger, to regret it and to reproach herself for causing him pain, and +then he would give her a little more time to long and ache for him to +return to her. He would wait until evening, and then he would go boldly +to the Gallito house and, no matter what efforts were made to frustrate +their meeting, he would see her alone. Ah, and she would fly to him, if +he knew her aright. All the opposition in the world could not keep them +apart, it would only strengthen her determination. And then, how he +would beg her forgiveness, how he would plead his love, with passionate +and irresistible eloquence; and, if he knew the heart of woman, she +would yield. + +But when the moment came for acting upon this decision he found that it +took a certain amount of courage, considerable, in fact, to face not +only a woman who had left him in hot anger that morning, but a gnarled +and thorny father and also the soft-spoken Bob Flick; and he decided to +stop at Pete's place and brace up his courage with a drink. + +Jimmy could hardly wait to serve him. He was like a busy and important +bird, hopping about on a bough and, literally, he twittered with +excitement. + +"Well," he exclaimed, "where you been keeping yourself, and why wasn't +you down to see 'em off?" + +A cold chill ran over Hanson. His impulse was to cry, "Who? What do you +mean?" But with an effort he resisted the inclination. Resolutely, he +held himself in check, and, although the hand with which he lifted the +glass to his lips trembled a little, he drank off the whisky before he +spoke. + +"Couldn't make it," he said. "Who went beside--" he paused inviting +Jimmy's further confidence. + +"Just Pearl and her father," returned Jimmy volubly. "I guess that was +the reason Bob went to Colina last week to kind of arrange for Pearl +going up to make a visit to the old man. But shucks!" he broke off, +"what am I telling you this for, when you know more than I do?" His +bright, beady eyes rested on Hanson's with pleased and eager +anticipation as he awaited further revelations. + +"Nothing more to tell," replied the other disappointedly. "It's all +just as you say. Well, I got to go up and see Mrs. Gallito. I'm off +myself early to-morrow morning. See you before that though. So long." + +He walked away, feeling dazed for the moment and beaten. Not at once did +he turn his steps in the direction of the Gallito home, but continued to +tramp up and down the road, and presently, as the cool, fresh air +restored his spirit, he was able to think clearly again. His world was +in chaos, but, even so, he still held some winning cards. He had no +intention, he gritted his teeth as he made this vow, of dropping out of +the game. He meant to play it to a finish. Those cards! He ran over his +hand mentally. There was that commanding trump--his knowledge, his +unsuspected knowledge of the whereabouts of Crop-eared José. Then his +next biggest trump--and here his heart lifted with a thrill--was the +fact that Pearl loved him. Yes, in spite of her anger, in spite of the +fact that she had rushed off to Colina, where she knew he could not +follow her, she loved him; and his desire for her was but increased by +the dangers and difficulties with which she surrounded herself. But he +must keep in touch with her, and the question as to how this might best +be accomplished rose in his mind. Mrs. Gallito was the almost immediate +answer, and he determined, no matter what objections might be raised, to +communicate with Pearl through that available source. Of one thing was +he convinced and that was that not for long would Pearl linger in the +gloomy mountains which he knew she abhorred. She belonged to the desert +or to the world of men and admiration, the world of light and color and +music. He couldn't see her in the mountains, he shivered a little at the +thought of her among them; the cold, silent, austere mountains, so alien +to this flower of the cactus. + +His first poignant disappointment over, and his plan of action decided +upon, he wasted no time in seeking Mrs. Gallito. He found her, to his +satisfaction, quite alone, Hughie having, as she told him, gone to spend +the evening with some friends. She had, before his arrival, been reading +the Sunday supplement of an eastern newspaper, gazing with longing eyes +at the portraits of the daughters of fashion and intently studying some +of the elaborate and intricate coiffures presented, in the hope that she +might achieve the same effects. + +"Why, Mr. Hanson!" she cried in surprise at the sight of him. "I thought +you'd gone sure, and Oh, mercy!" putting her hands to her head, "I ain't +on my puffs." + +"I wouldn't ever have known it," said Hanson truthfully. "The fact is +I'm not noticing anything much, Mrs. Gallito, I got a lot on my mind." +He sighed unfeignedly and she noticed that he looked both tired and +worried. "And say, I wish you'd sit down and talk to me a little." + +She still stood looking at him hesitatingly, a distressed expression on +her face. "I--I don't know as I'd better," she faltered. "Gallito, he +said, the very last thing he said, was that if you come around--Oh, Mr. +Hanson," she sat down weakly in her chair and began to cry. "I thought +you was just about the nicest man I'd met for many a day, and here I +find you're a dreadful scamp. Oh, dear! Oh, dear! I guess all men are +alike!" + +Hanson bent forward earnestly. He had an end to gain and he meant to +gain it. "Now look here, Mrs. Gallito," he said. "You don't want to +condemn me unheard. You're not that kind of a lady. I knew that the +first minute I set eyes on you. Now understand I'm not trying to +persuade you that I'm any better than I am, but I just want you to +believe that I'm not quite so black as I'm painted, not as black as your +husband and Bob Flick want to paint me, anyway." + +She twisted a fold of her dress, already half-persuaded and yet still a +little doubtful. "But you never gave us a hint that you were married," +she ventured timidly. + +"Honest to God, I forget it myself," he asserted devoutly. "How can a +man be always thinking to tell everyone he meets that he's still in a +legal tie-up, when the only way he can remember it himself is by coming +across his marriage certificate, now and then? Why, it's a good ten +years since me and that woman parted. You don't call that married?" + +His positive personality exerted its usual influence over Mrs. Gallito. +"'Course not," she agreed, although she still sat with downcast eyes and +pleated her dress. + +"I'm a pretty lonely man," pathos in his voice, "and I'd kind of gotten +into the way of putting home and happiness and all like that away from +me; and then I came here and saw Pearl," he was sincere enough now, "and +honest, Mrs. Gallito, it was all up with me then, right from the first +minute, and I was so plumb crazy about her that I guess I lost my head. +I knew all the time that I ought to tell you and her just how I was +fixed, I knew it, but, someways, try as I would, I couldn't. I didn't +have the nerve, so I just waited and let the cards fall as they would. +Maybe I was a fool and a coward. The way things have turned out, it sure +looks like I was, but I just couldn't help it." + +"I guess you ain't any different from most men," she answered, weakly +sympathetic, "but you see Pearl has her notions, and they're mighty +strong ones. It's the way she's been brought up," this with some pride. +"You see, me and her pop started out with the idea that we wasn't going +to have the Pearl live one of those hand to mouth lives that we'd seen +girls in the circus that didn't have much training or much ability live. +We saw right from the first that she was awful smart and awful pretty, +and her Pop he had the knack of making money and holding on to it. Well, +when he saw that she had her head set on the stage and we couldn't keep +her off it, it's in her blood, you see, why her Pop says: 'Well, there's +one thing, till she's of age, legal, on or off the stage, she's going to +have a mother's care and a father showing up every now and then +unexpected.' He's got awful Spanish ideas, you know. 'I don't want her +kept innocent,' he says. 'My Lord, no. It's the innocent ones that have +got to pay, and pay big in a world of bad knowledge where ignorance is +not forgave and is punished worse than any crime. Let her see the seamy +side,' he says, 'she's no fool. Let her see what those who thinks to +live easy and gives themselves away easy gets.' + +"And Pearl saw right off. You see, she ain't so soft-hearted like me," +again she wiped the furtive tear from her eye. "Pearl's hard. She ain't +no conscience about some things. She'll lead a man on and on, when she +don't care beans for him, and take all he'll give her, not money, you +know, but awful handsome presents. I've seen her let some poor boy that +was crazy about her blow in all the dust that he'd saved for a year. Oh, +yes, she's like her father in more'n one way, both awful ambitious and +terrible fond of making money. Why," she added naïvely, "I've seen Pearl +look at a bank note like I never saw her look at a love letter." + +"Well, she won't make much money up in those mountains, not dancing, +anyway," he laughed briefly and unmirthfully. + +"It surprised me a lot, her going," admitted Mrs. Gallito; "she hates +the mountains." + +"Then she won't stay long," put in Hanson quickly. + +Mrs. Gallito was uncertain about this. "But," she confided presently, +"she took on awful to her father and Bob Flick. I didn't dare come out, +but I heard her through the door there. 'Where can I go,' she cried, +'where he won't come?' And she kept on saying she'd got to go somewhere +where you would never find her, because she didn't dare trust herself, +and she cried right out: 'I love him, I love him.'" + +With these words, the confirmation of his hope, Hanson's blithe +self-confidence returned. He threw back his head and straightened his +shoulders, the light of an exultant purpose flashing in the steel of his +eye. "Pleasant for Bob!" he remarked in vindictive satisfaction; but as +he had still an end to gain, he did not permit his mind to gloat long +upon the agreeable picture Mrs. Gallito's words had suggested. + +"Now, just let me talk a minute, Mrs. Gallito," leaning forward and +speaking in his most persuasive manner. "This whole thing is a +misunderstanding, that's all. Pearl didn't understand what I was trying +to say to her, and she lost her temper and wouldn't let me finish. Now +taking all the blame to myself for everything, admitting that I haven't +acted right in any particular, still I haven't had a square deal. You've +got the sand and the fairness to admit that, Mrs. Gallito, and I may say +in passing that you're the only one that has, and you've got to admit +that I haven't had a square deal; not from the Pearl, God bless her, and +certainly not from her Pop and that Flick," his eyes flashed viciously. + +Mrs. Gallito filled up his waiting pause with a murmur of confused but +sympathetic assent. + +"I'm telling you now what I'd told them if they'd given me a chance, and +it's this," emphasizing his words by striking the palm of one hand with +the forefinger of the other, "I'm going back to Los Angeles and I'm +going to move heaven and earth to get free; but in the meantime, Mrs. +Gallito, I got to hear from her, I've got to keep in touch with her, and +I believe you've got too much heart and too much common sense not to +help me." + +She drew back with feeble, inarticulate murmurs of fright and protest. +"I wouldn't dare," she began. + +"Wait a moment," said Hanson soothingly. "I'm not suggesting anything +that could get you into trouble. Mercy, no! All I want you to do is +this, just write me now and then and let me know how things are going, +and maybe, once in a while, slip a letter of mine in one of yours to +Pearl; but," as she gasped a little and opened her eyes widely, "not +till you're sure it's quite safe." + +"Well," she agreed, still in evident perturbation of mind, "maybe--" + +"Oh, Mrs. Gallito," pleadingly, "can't you see that me and Pearl are +born for one another? You know that she can't live away from the +footlights. She just can't. And you know that I can put her where she +belongs. You know that our hearts are better guides than all Bob Flick +and her Pop can plan for her." + +His efforts were not wasted. As he had foreseen, his arguments were of a +nature to appeal to Mrs. Gallito, and it required only a little more +persuasion to win her promise of assistance. He further flattered her +self-esteem by interlarding his profuse thanks with vague hints of the +extreme lengths to which his despair might have led him had it not been +for the saving power of her sympathy and understanding. + +He had already risen and was halfway to the door before he appeared to +remember something. "Oh," halting, his hand on the latch, "where is +that--that José? Pearl could not go up there with him about." + +Mrs. Gallito, all timorousness again, beat her hands lightly together, +in a distressful flurry. "No, he's there," she whispered, and glanced +anxiously about her. Then she came nearer. "I heard Gallito and Bob +talking about him only yesterday and Bob said there was some mischief +brewing among José's pals down on the coast, and Gallito said, yes, and +if he let José leave the mountain he'd be right back there again and in +the thick of it and sure to be taken and that he, Gallito, meant to keep +José in Colina all year, if necessary." + +So great was Hanson's satisfaction at this news that he had difficulty +in concealing it, but Mrs. Gallito was not an observant person, +fortunately, and, hastily changing the subject, he again expressed his +thanks and departed. + +He left the next morning for Los Angeles to the regret of his +benefactress, Jimmy and the station agent. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +The train which bore Pearl and her father to Colina had already +completed its smooth progress through smiling foot hills and had begun a +steep and winding ascent among wild gorges and great overhanging rocks +before she noticed the change. + +For the greater part of the journey she had sat motionless, huddled in a +corner of the seat, a thick veil covering her face; but now she began to +observe the physical changes in the landscape with a somber +satisfaction, and, for the first time, accepted the mountains +listlessly, almost gratefully, instead of rebelliously. In truth any +change was grateful to her; she did not want to think of the desert or +be reminded of it, and this transition, so marked, so sharply defined as +to make the brief railway journey from the plains below seem the passage +to another world, was especially welcome. + +The human desire for change is rooted in the conviction, a vain and +deceptive one, that an entirely different environment must include or +create a new world of thought and emotion. So for once the Pearl's +desire was for the hills. She who had ever exulted in the wide, free +spaces of the desert, who had found the echo of her own heart in its +eternal mutation, its luring illusions, its mystery and its beauty, now +turned to the austere, shadowed, silent mountains as if begging them to +enfold her and hold her and hide her. + +It was dark when they reached Colina, but a station wagon awaited them +and in this they drove through the village, a straggling settlement, the +narrow plateau permitting only two streets, both of them continuations +of the mountain roads, and surrounded by high mountains. Scattering +lights showed here and there from lamps shining through cabin windows, +but the silence, differing in kind if not in degree from the desert +silence, was only broken at this hour of the night by the desolate, +mocking bark of the coyotes. + +Clear of the village, the horses turned and began to mount the hill +which led to Gallito's isolated cabin. Their progress was necessarily +slow, for the road was rough and full of deep ruts. The velvety +blackness of a mountain night was all about them and even the late +spring air seemed icy cold. Pearl had begun to shiver in spite of her +wraps when the light from a cabin window gleamed across the road and the +driver pulled up his horses. + +"Somebody's waiting for you," said the driver. + +"Yes, Saint Harry," answered Gallito. "He's getting supper for us." + +The door, however, was not opened for them and it was not until the +driver had turned his horses down the hill that they heard a bolt +withdrawn. Then Gallito pushed in and Pearl followed, stepping wearily +across the threshold. + +The room, a large one for a mountain cabin, was warm and clean; some +logs burned brightly on the hearth; a table set for supper was placed +within the radius of that glow and a man was bending over a stove at one +side of the fireplace, while two women, who had evidently been seated on +the other side of the fire, rose and stood smiling a welcome. The air +was full of appetizing odors mingled with the fragrance of coffee. + +As they entered the man turned with a quick movement. He was an +odd-looking creature, brown as a nut, with glinting, changing, glancing +eyes which can see what seem to be immeasurable distances to those +possessed of ordinary sight. He had a curiously crooked face, one eye +was higher than the other and his nose was not in the middle, but set on +one side; its sharp, inquisitive point almost at right angles with the +bridge. He had the wide, mobile mouth of the born comedian, and his chin +was as much to the right as his nose was to the left. He was extremely +light and slender in figure and his movements were like quicksilver. His +hair was black and straight and long, especially over the ears, and he +had long, slender, delicate hands, which one noticed at once for their +uncommon flexibility and deftness. + +"Supper ready?" asked Gallito, without other greeting. + +"Now," replied the other man. He began lifting the food he had been +preparing from the pans, arranging it on various dishes and slipping +them upon the table with a rapidity and noiselessness which suggested +sleight of hand. + +Gallito gave a brief nod and advanced toward the two women, bowing low +with Spanish courtesy. A smile, a blending of pleasure and amusement, +softened his grim mouth and keen eyes as he shook hands with one, whom +he introduced to his daughter as Mrs. Nitschkan. About medium height, +she was a powerfully built creature, her open flannel shirt disclosing +the great muscles of her neck and chest. Rings of short, curly brown +hair covered her round head; and small, twinkling blue eyes shone oddly +bright in her deeply tanned face, while her frequent smile displayed +small, milk-white teeth. A short, weather-stained skirt showed her +miner's boots and a man's coat was thrown over her shoulders. A bold, +freebooting Amazon she appeared, standing there in the fire-glow, and +one to whom hardihood was a birth-right. + +The other woman towered above her and even above Gallito. She was a +colossal Venus, with a face pink and white as a may-blossom. Tremulous +smiles played about her soft, babyish mouth and a joyous excitement +shone in her wide, blue eyes. Upon her head was a small, lop-sided +bonnet, from which depended a rusty crêpe veil of which she seemed +inordinately conscious, and at the throat of her black gown was a large, +pink bow. + +"Make you acquainted with Mis' Thomas, Miss Gallito," said Mrs. +Nitschkan heartily. "Marthy's one of my oldest friends an' one of my +newest converts. She's all right if she could let the boys alone, an' +not be always tangled up in some flirtation that her friends has got to +sit up nights scheming to get her out of. That pink bow an' that crêpe +veil shows she ain't got the right idea of her responsibilities as a +widow. So I brought her up to my little cabin, just a quarter of a mile +through the trees there, hopin' I'd get her mind turned on more sensible +things than men. Gosh a'mighty! She's got a chance to shoot bear here." + +"I don't think you got any call to introduce me to the Black Pearl +that-a-way, Sadie." Mrs. Thomas's eyes filled with ready tears. "It +ain't manners. I wouldn't have come with her, Miss Gallito, but I got to +see pretty plain that the gentleman," here she blushed and bridled, +"that was courting me was awful anxious to get hold of the money and the +cabin that my last husband, in his grave 'most six months now, left me." +She wiped the tears from her eyes on the back of her hand, a movement +hampered somewhat by the fact that her handkerchief had been fashioned +into a bag to hold some chocolate creams and was tied tightly to her +thumb. + +"That's what you get for cavorting around with a spindle-shanked, +knock-kneed, mush-brained jack-rabbit of a man," muttered Mrs. Nitschkan +scornfully. + +But this thrust was ignored by Mrs. Thomas. The color had risen on her +cheeks and there was a light in her eyes. Shyly, yet gleefully, she drew +a letter from her pocket. "I got a letter from him to-day with an awful +cute motto in it. Look!" She showed it proudly to Pearl, José and +Gallito. "It's on cream-tinted paper, with a red and blue border, an'," +simpering consciously, "it says in black and gold letters, 'A Little +Widow Is a Dangerous Thing.'" + +The little group seemed for the moment too stunned to speak. Mrs. +Nitschkan was the first to recover herself. "Gosh a'mighty!" she +murmured in an awed whisper, and allowed her glance to travel slowly +over Mrs. Thomas's well-cushioned, six feet of womanhood, +"A--little--widow!" huskily. + +Gallito seized the opportunity here to direct Pearl's attention to the +bandit, who had been nudging him and whispering to him for the last +moment or so. + +"Pearl, this is--" he hesitated a moment, "José." + +Mrs. Nitschkan looked up at him in quick astonishment. "Gosh a'mighty," +she cried, "ain't that kind o' reckless?" + +But José nodded a quick, cynical approval and, with a sudden turn, +executed a deep bow to the Pearl, one hand on the heart, expressing +gallantry, fealty, the humblest admiration; all these sincere and yet +permeated with a subtle and volatile mockery. + +"Better so, Francisco," he said in a voice which scarcely betrayed an +accent, and indeed this was not strange considering that he spoke the +patois of many people, being a born linguist. His father had been a +Frenchman, a Gascon, but his mother was a daughter of Seville. "But you +have not said all." He drew himself up with haughty and self-conscious +pride and, with a sweeping gesture of his long fingers, lifted the hair +from his ears and stood thus, leering like Pan. + +"Crop-eared José!" cried Pearl, falling back a pace or two and looking +from her father to the two women in wide-eyed astonishment. "Why, they +are still looking for him. Are you not afraid?" She looked from one to +the other as if asking the question of all. She was not shocked, nor, to +tell the truth, particularly surprised after the first moment of wonder. +She had been used to strange company all her life, and ever since her +childhood, on her brief visits to her father's cabin, she had been +accustomed to his cronies, lean, brown, scarred pirates and picaroons, +full of strange Spanish oaths. + +"You will not mention this in letters to your mother," ordered Gallito, +glooming at her with fierce eyes. "You know her. Caramba! If she should +guess, the world would know it." + +"Lord, yes!" agreed Pearl uninterestedly. "You needn't be afraid of me," +to José, "I don't tell what I know." + +"That is true," commended Gallito, motioning her at the same time to the +table. + +It seems a pity to record that such a supper was set before a woman +suffering from a wound of the heart. Women at all times are held to be +lacking in that epicurean appreciation of good food which man justly +extols; but when a woman's whole being is absorbed in a disappointment +in love, nectar and ambrosia are as sawdust to her. + +On the outer rim of that circle which knew him but slightly, or merely +knew of him, the causes of the charmed life which José bore were a +matter of frequent speculation, also continual wonder was expressed that +his friends would sometimes take incredible risks in effecting the +escape of this rogue after one of his reckless escapades. But José had +certain positive qualities, had these gossips but known it, which +endeared him to his companions; although among them could never be +numbered gratitude, a lively appreciation of benefits received or a +tried and true affection. + +Certainly a dog-like fidelity was not among José's virtues. He would +lift the purse of his best friend or his rescuer from a desperate +impasse, provided it were sufficiently heavy. A favor of a nature to put +him under obligations for a lifetime he forgot as soon as it was +accepted. He caricatured a benefactor to his face, nor ever dreamed of +sparing friend or foe his light, pointed jibes which excoriated the +surface of the smoothest vanity. + +No, the only virtues which could be accredited to José, and these were +sufficient, were an unfailing lightness of heart, the facile and +fascinating gift of yarn-spinning--for he was a born raconteur, with a +varied experience to draw upon--a readiness for high play, at which he +lost and won with the same gay and unruffled humor, and an incomparable +and heaven-bestowed gift of cookery. + +To-night the very sight of the supper set before him softened Gallito's +harsh face. Brook trout, freshly caught that afternoon from the rushing +mountain stream not far away from the cabin, and smoking hot from the +frying pan; an omelette, golden brown and buttercup yellow, of a fluff, +a fragrance, with savories hidden beneath its surface, a conserve of +fruits, luscious, amber and subtly biting, the coffee of dreams and a +bottle of red wine, smooth as honey. + +"I hope you don't think that we're the kind of wolves that's always +gatherin' round wherever there's a snack of food," murmured Mrs. Thomas +softly as she took a seat beside Pearl. "We got our own cabin just a +piece up in the woods, but José, he kind of wanted to make a celebration +of your coming up." + +Pearl did not answer, but slipped languidly out of her cloak, untwisted +her heavy veil, removed her hat, José's eyes as well as Mrs. Thomas's +following her the while with unmixed admiration, and sat down. + +José immediately began to roll cigarettes and smoke them while he ate. + +"Well, what is the news?" asked Gallito, as he, at least, began his +evening meal with every evidence of appreciation; "good fishing, good +hunting, good prospecting, eh, Mrs. Nitschkan?" + +The gipsy, for she was one by birth as well as by inclination, nodded +and showed her teeth in a satisfied smile. "So good that it looks like +we'd be kep' here even longer than I expected when we come." She drew +some bits of quartz from her pocket and threw them out on the table +before him. "Some specimens I chipped off in my new prospect," she said, +her eyes upon him. + +"So," he said, examining them with interest, "your luck, Mrs. Nitschkan, +as usual. Where--? Excuse me," a dark flush rose on his parchment skin +at this breach of mining-camp etiquette which he had almost committed. + +For a few moments they talked exclusively of the mining interests of +the locality. It is this feverish, inexhaustible topic that is almost +exclusively dwelt upon in mining camps, all other topics seeming tame +and commonplace beside this fascinating subject, presided over by the +golden fairy of fortune and involving her. To-day she tempts and eludes, +she tantalizes and mocks and flies her thousands of wooers who follow +her to the rocks, seeking her with back-breaking toil and dreaming ever +of her by day and by night. Variable and cruel, deaf to all beseeching, +she picks out her favorites by some rule of caprice which none but +herself understands. + +Supper over, Gallito ensconced his two feminine visitors in easy chairs +and took one himself, while José, with noiseless deftness, cleared away +the remains of food. Pearl had wandered to the window and, drawing the +curtain aside, stood gazing out into the featureless, black expanse of +the night. + +"Quite a few things has happened since I saw you last, Gallito," said +Mrs. Nitschkan conversationally, filling a short and stubby black pipe +with loose tobacco from the pocket of her coat. "For one, I got +converted." + +"Ah!" returned Gallito with his unvarying courtesy, although his raised +eyebrows showed some perplexity, "to--to--a religion?" + +"'Course." Mrs. Nitschkan leaned forward, her arms upon her knees. "This +world's the limit, Gallito, and queer things is going to happen whether +you're looking for 'em or not. About a year ago Jack and the boys went +off on a long prospectin' spell, the girls you know are all married and +have homes of their own, an' there was me left free as air with a dandy +spell of laziness right in front of me ready to be catched up 'twixt my +thumb and forefinger and put in my pipe and smoked, and I hadn't even +the spirit to grab it." + +"Why didn't you think about getting yourself some new clothes, like any +other woman would?" asked José, eyeing her curiously. + +"What I got's good enough for me," she returned shortly. + +"You should have gave your place a nice cleaning and cooked a little for +a change, Sadie," said Mrs. Thomas softly and virtuously. + +"Such things look worse'n dying to me," replied the gipsy. "And," +turning again to Gallito, "the taste goin' out of my tea and coffee +wasn't the worst. It went out of my pipe, too. Gosh a'mighty, Gallito! +I'll never forget the night I sat beside my dyin' fire and felt that I +didn't even take no interest in winnin' their money from the boys; and +then suddenly most like a voice from outside somep'n in me says: 'What's +the matter with you, Sadie Nitschkan, is that you're a reapin' the +harvest you've sowed, gipsyin' and junketin', fightin' and gamblin' with +no thought of the serious side of life?'" + +"And what is the serious side of life, Nitschkan?" asked José, sipping +delicately his glass of wine as if to taste to the full its ambrosial +flavors, like the epicure he was. "I have not yet discovered it." + +"You will soon." There was meaning in the gipsy's tone and in the +glance she bestowed upon him. "It's doin' good. I tell you boys when I +realized that I'd probably have to change myself within and without and +be like some of the pious folks I'd seen, it give me a gone feeling in +the pit of my stomach. But you can't keep me down, and after I'd saw I +was a sinner and repented 'cause I was so bad, I saw that the whole +trouble was this, I'd tried everything else, but I hadn't never tried +doin' good." + +"No, Sadie, you sure hadn't made duty the watch-word of your life," +agreed Mrs. Thomas. + +Mrs. Nitschkan ignored this. "Now doin' good, for I know you don't know +what that means, José, is seein' the right path and makin' other folks +walk in it whether they're a mind to or not. Well I cert'ny gave the +sinners of Zenith a run for their money." + +She smoked a moment or two in silence, sunk in agreeable remembrance. +She had been true to her word and, having decided to reform as much of +the community as in her estimation needed that trial as by fire, she had +plunged into her self-appointed task with lusty enthusiasm. As soon as +her conversion and the outlet she had chosen for her superabundant +energy were noised abroad, there was an immediate and noticeable change +in the entire deportment of the camp. Those long grown careless drew +forth their old morals and manners, brushed the moths from them, +burnished the rust and wore them with undeniable self-consciousness, but +without ostentation. + +Upon these lukewarm and conforming souls Mrs. Nitschkan cast a darkling +eye. It was the recalcitrant, the defiant, the professing sinner upon +whom she concentrated her energies. + +"So you see, Gallito," rousing herself from pleasant contemplation of +past triumphs, "it wasn't only a chance to hunt and prospect that +brought me. I heard from Bob Flick that José was still here and I see a +duty before me." + +"She could not keep away from me," José rolled his eyes sentimentally. +"You see beneath that rough old jacket of her husband's which she wears +there beats a heart." + +"I got some'p'n else that can beat and that's a fist." She stretched out +her arm and drew it back, gazing with pride at her great, swelling +muscles. + +"But never me, who will tidy your cabin and cook half your meals for +you." He smiled ingratiatingly at Mrs. Thomas, who grew deeply pink +under his admiring smile. "Why do you not convert Saint Harry?" + +"Harry's all right," she said. "You need convertin', he don't. I got an +idea that he's been right through the fiery furnace like them Bible boys +in their asbestos coats, he's smelted." + +"Harry got my telegram?" asked Gallito, speaking in a low tone, after +first glancing toward Pearl, "and you have made a room ready for her?" + +"Clean as a convent cell," said José, with his upcurling, mordant smile. +"The wind has roared through it all day and swept away every trace of +tobacco and my thoughts." + +"That is well," replied Gallito with a sardonic twist of the mouth, +"and where do you sleep to-night?" + +"In Saint Harry's cabin." + +"So," Gallito nodded as if content. "That will be best." + +"Best for both," agreed José, a flicker of mirth on his face. "My +constant companionship is good for Harry. It is not well to think you +have shown the Devil the door, kicked him down the hill and forgotten +him; and that he has taken his beating, learned his lesson and gone +forever. It is then that the Devil is dangerous. It is better, Gallito, +believe me, to remain on good terms with him, to humor him and to pass +the time of day. Humility is a great virtue and you should be willing to +learn something even of the Devil, not set yourself up on a high, cold, +sharp mountain peak, where you keep his fingers itching from morning to +night to throw you off. I have observed these things through the years +of my life, and the middle course is ever the safest. Give to the +church, observe her laws as a true and obedient son, in so far as +possible, and only so far. Let her get her foot on your neck and she +will demand such sacrifices!" He lifted his hands and rolled his eyes +upward, "but the Devil is more reasonable; treat him civilly, be a good +comrade to him and he will let you alone. But Saint Harry does not +understand that. Saint Harry on his ice peak, and the Devil straddling +around trying to find a foothold so that he can climb up to Harry and +seize him with those itching fingers. Ho, ho!" José's laughter rang loud +and shrill. + +Pearl, hearing it, turned from the window with a disturbed frown and +began to walk up and down the far end of the room, and Mrs. Nitschkan +frowned ominously. "That's enough of your talk, José," she said +peremptorily. "It sounds like blasphemin' to me, talkin' about the Devil +that light way. Remember one of the reasons I come here. Gallito, you'd +better lay out the cards and let's get down to our game. What's the +limit?" + +"Does Mrs. Thomas play as high as you?" asked Gallito. + +"I don't care much for a tame game," said Mrs. Thomas modestly, with +lowered lids. "They're too many long, sad winters in the mountains when +gentl--, I mean friends, can't cross the trails to see you, an' you got +to fill up your heart with cards and religion and things like that." + +José had paused to watch, with a keen appreciation, the grace of Pearl's +movements. "Caramba!" he muttered. "How sprang that flower of Spain from +such a gnarled old tree as you, Gallito? Dios! But she is salado!" + +Gallito frowned a little, which did not in the least disconcert José, +and, rising, he moved a small table forward, opened it and then going to +a cupboard in the wall drew from it a short, squat bottle, four glasses +and a pack of cards. "Your room is just beyond this," he said, turning +to Pearl. "José says that you will find everything ready for you. You +must be tired. You had better go to bed." + +Pearl twitched her shoulders impatiently. "I am not sleepy," she said +sullenly. She threw herself in the chair that Gallito had vacated and +lay there watching the fire with somber, wild eyes. + +José threw another log on the fire and then the two men and two women +sat down to their cards. A clock ticked steadily, monotonously, on the +mantel-piece, but whether an hour or ten minutes passed while she sat +there watching the brilliant, soaring flame of the pine logs Pearl could +not have told, when suddenly the stillness of the night was broken by +the sound of someone whistling along the road. It seemed a long way off +at first, but gradually came nearer and nearer, tuneful and clear as the +song of a bobolink. + +"Saint Harry, by all the saints or devils!" cried José with a burst of +his shrill laughter. "Ah, Francisco, the devil is a shrewd fellow; when +he can't manage a job himself, he always gets a woman to help him." His +glancing, twinkling eyes sought Pearl, who had barely turned her head as +her father rose to open the door for the newcomer, exclaiming with some +show of cordiality: + +"Ah, Seagreave, come in, come in." + +"Thanks," said an agreeable voice. "I got home late and found that José +had made preparations to lighten my loneliness. Then I saw the light in +your window and thought I would come down. You see I suspected pleasant +company." + +He advanced into the room and then, seeing Pearl, who had twisted about +in her chair and was gazing at him with the first show of interest she +had yet exhibited, he paused and looked rather hesitatingly at Gallito. + +"We have a guest," said José softly and in Spanish. + +"My daughter has returned with me," said Gallito. "Pearl, this is Mr. +Seagreave." + +"Saint Harry," said José more softly still. + +Mr. Seagreave bowed, although one who knew him well might have seen that +his astonishment increased rather than abated at the sight of Pearl. As +for her, she merely nodded and let her lashes lie the more wearily and +indifferently upon her cheek. + +"Really, I wouldn't have intruded," said Seagreave in his pleasant +English voice. "I had an idea from your telegram, Gallito, that Hughie +was coming with you. Sha'n't I go?" + +For answer Gallito pushed forward a chair and threw another log upon the +fire. "My daughter is tired," he said. "She will soon retire; but when a +man has been from home for a fortnight, and in the desert!" he raised +his brows expressively, "Pah! He wishes to hear of everything which has +happened during his absence and particularly, Mr. Seagreave, do I wish +to talk to you about that lower drift. José tells me that you have +examined it." + +Thus urged, Seagreave sat down. He was tall and slight and fair, so very +fair that his age was difficult to guess. His hair, with a silvery sheen +on it, swept in a wing across his forehead, and he had a habit of +pushing it back from his brow; his eyes were of a vivid blue, peculiarly +luminous, and his features, which were regular, showed a fine finish of +modeling. His age, as has been said, was a matter of conjecture, but +judging from his appearance he might have been anywhere from twenty to +forty. + +"Don't let me interrupt your game," he said. "It is early yet, and if +Miss Gallito isn't too tired, and if she will let me, I will talk to her +while you play." + +José smiled to himself and picked up the cards. The game went on. +Seagreave, receiving no encouragement from Pearl, made no attempt at +conversation, until at last, stirred by some impulse of curiosity, she +lifted her eyes. It was this question of age she wished to decide. In +that first, quick glance of hers she had taken it for granted that he +was twenty, but in a second stolen look she had noted certain lines +about the mouth and eyes which added years to his blonde youthfulness. +Then her quick ear had caught José's "Saint Harry," and to her, who knew +many men, those lines about mouth and eyes did not suggest a past of +saintship. + +Her surreptitious glance encountered that of Seagreave, for he, too, had +withdrawn his eyes from the fire for a moment to let his puzzled gaze +rest upon her. He had known vaguely that Gallito had a daughter, and he +remembered in the same indefinite way that some one had told him that +she was an actress, but, even so, he could not reconcile this--his mind +sought a simile to express her--this exotic, with Gallito, these two +mountain women, a mountain cabin, and an equally unpretentious home in +the desert. She lay listlessly in her chair, a long and slender shape in +a dull black gown which fell about her in those statuesque folds which +all drapery assumed immediately she donned it; beneath it showed her +feet in black satin slippers and the gleam of the satin seemed repeated +in her blue-black hair. Her cheek was unwontedly pale. A monotone she +appeared, half-within and half-without the zone of the firelight; but +the individuality of her could not be thus subdued. It found expression +in the concentration of light and color focused in the splendid rings +which sparkled on the long, brown fingers of both her hands. + +Her narrow eyes met his sombrously. On either side it was a glance of +curiosity, of scrutiny. She, as usual, made no effort to begin a +conversation, and he, searching for a polite commonplace, said +presently: + +"Have you ever been in Colina before?" + +"Often, but not in the last two years," she answered tonelessly, "not +since you've been here, I guess. I hate the mountains." + +"I have been here nearly two years," he vouchsafed, "and I feel as if I +would never go away. But you live in the desert, don't you?" + +"Sometimes, that is, when I'm not out on the road. The desert is the +place. You can breathe there, you can live there," there was a +passionate vibration in her voice, "but these old, cold mountains make +you feel all the time as if they were going to fall on you and crush +you." + +"Do they make you feel that way?" He pulled his chair nearer to her so +that his back was turned to the two men, and José, who saw everything, +smiled faintly, mordaciously. "How strange!" It was not a conventional +expression, he seemed really to find it strange, unbelievably so. + +"And you, how do they make you feel?" she asked wearily, a touch of +scorn in her glance. + +A light seemed to glow over his face. "Ah, I do not know that I can tell +you," he said, and she was conscious of some immediate change in him, +which she apprehended but could never have defined. It was as if he had +withdrawn mentally to incalculable distances. + +Pearl did not notice his evasion; she was not interested in his view of +the mountains. What she instinctively resented, even in her dulled +state, was his impersonal attitude toward herself. She was not used to +it from any man. She did not understand it. She wondered, without any +particular interest in the matter, but still following her instinctive +and customary mode of thought, if he had not noticed that she was +beautiful. Was he so stupid that he did not think her so? But there was +no hint in his manner or look in his eyes of an intention on his part of +playing the inevitable game, even a remembrance of it seemed as lacking +as desire. The game of challenge and elusion on her part, of perpetual +and ever more ardent advance on his. He was interested, she knew that, +but, as she felt with a surge of surprise, not in the way she had always +encountered and had learned to expect. + +"Isn't it strange," she realized that he was speaking again, "that I +haven't been drawn to the desert, because so many have had to turn to +it? I have only seen it from traveling across it, and then it repelled +me, perhaps it frightened me." He seemed to consider this. + +For the moment Pearl forgot the inevitable game. "Frightened you!" she +cried. "It is the mountains that frighten me; but the desert is always +different. It--" she struggled for expression, "it is always you." + +Something in this seemed to strike him. "Perhaps I have that to learn." +Again he meditated a few moments, then looked up with a smile. "You must +tell me all that you find in the desert and I will tell you all that I +find in the mountains. It will be jolly to talk to a woman again." He +spoke with a satisfaction thoroughly genuine. + +She glanced at him suspiciously. She was uncertain how to meet this +frank acceptance of comradeship, free yet from the intrusion of sex. +"Maybe," she acquiesced a little doubtfully. Then she drew her brows +together. "I don't want to learn anything about the mountains," she +cried, all the heaviness and the dumb revolt of her spirit finding a +voice. "And I don't want ever to go back to the desert again; and I +don't even want to dance," looking at him in a sort of wild wonder as if +this were unbelievable, "not even to dance." + +He realized that she was suffering from some grief against which she +struggled, and which she refused to accept. "You will not feel so +always," he said. "It is because you are unhappy now." + +There was consolation in his sincerity, in his sympathy, in his entire +belief in what he was saying, and it was with difficulty that she +repressed an outburst of her sullen sorrow. "Yes," her mouth worked, "I +am unhappy, and I won't be, I won't be. I never was before. It is all in +here, like a dead weight, a drag, a cold hand clutching me." She pressed +both hands to her heart. Then she drew back as if furious at having so +far revealed herself. + +"That heals." He leaned forward to speak. "I am telling you the truth! +That heals and is forgotten. I know that that is so." + +"I know who you are," she said suddenly. "I have been trying to think +ever since I heard him," she nodded toward José, bent over his cards, +"say 'Saint Harry.' I remember now. I have heard Hughie often speak of +you. They say that you are good, that if any one is sick you nurse him, +and that if any one is broke you help him. They all come to you." + +"Yes, 'Saint Harry'!" he laughed. "Oh, it's funny, but let them call me +any name they please as long as it amuses them. What difference does it +make? I am glad Hughie is coming up, I want some music. He puts the +mountains into music for me." + +"And for me." She smiled and then sighed bitterly, gazing drearily into +the fire, now a bed of glowing embers. Then latent and feminine +curiosity stirred in her thoughts and voiced itself. "Why are you here?" +she said. "Why does a man like you stay here?" + +His elbow rested on the arm of his chair, his chin in his hand, his gaze +too upon the fading embers. "I don't know," he said in a low voice, "I +had to come." + +"Where from?" she still followed her instinct of curiosity. + +"From the husks"--he turned his head and smiled at her--"from a far +country where I had wasted my substance in riotous living." + +She frowned a little. She was not used to this type of man, nor had she +met any one who used hyperbole in conversation. At first she fancied +that he might be chaffing her, but she was too intelligent to harbor +that idea, so convincing was his innate sincerity; but nevertheless, she +meant to go cautiously. + +Again she questioned him: "From what far country?" + +He had fallen to musing again, and it is doubtful if he heard her. He +saw before him immense, primeval forests, black, shadowy; vast, sluggish +rivers, above which hung a thick and fever-laden air; trees from whose +topmost branches swung gorgeous, ephemeral flowers; and then long +stretches of yellow beach, where a brazen ocean tumbled and hissed. Then +many cities, squalid and splendid, colorful and fantastic as the +erection of a dream, and through all these he saw himself ever passing, +appearing and reappearing, and ever scattering his substance, not the +substance of money alone; that was still left him; but the substance of +youth, of early promise, of illusion and hopes. + +Pearl waited a long time, it seemed to her, for him to speak. At last +she broke the silence. "And then?" she said. + +He roused from his preoccupations and brushed back the wing of hair from +his brow. "I realized that I was living, had always lived on husks, and +that was what caused the restless fever in my blood, my heart was +always restless; and then I began to dream down there in the tropics, +really dream at night of these mountains just as you see them here, and +in the day time I thought of them and longed for them, as a man whose +throat is dry with thirst longs for cool water. Then, presently, I began +to have brief, fleeting visions of them by day. And gradually the +longing for the hills became so intense that I started out in search of +them. I traveled about a good bit, and then drifted here. The place +suited me, so I stayed." + +She looked at him puzzled and half-fearfully, wondering if he was quite +sane. "And will you stay here always?" she asked. + +"Oh, as to that, I can't say. Perhaps. I hope so. Life is full here." + +"Full!" she interrupted him. "And life! You call this life?" She laughed +in harsh scorn. + +"Don't you?" He looked at her with those blue, clear eyes that seemed to +see through her and around her and beyond her. + +"I!" Her glance was full of resentful passion; tightly she closed her +lips; but there was something about him which seemed to force her to +reveal herself and, presently, she began again. "I am like a coyote with +a broken paw. It goes off by itself and hides until it can limp around. +But life, real life, is all out there." She threw out her hands as +indicating the world beyond the mountains. "If you call this life, +you've never lived." + +He ignored this, smiling faintly. + +"What is real life to you?" he asked. + +So compelling was his manner, for no one could shock Seagreave and no +one could force him to condemn, that she almost said, "To love and be +loved." But she resisted her impulse to voice this. "Until a little +while before I came here, life meant to dance. I know, though, what it +is to get tired of the very things you think you love the most. After +I've stayed a while in the desert, I've just got to see the lights of +the city streets, to smell the stage, and to dance to the big audiences; +but after a bit, the buildings and the people begin to crowd on me and +push me and I feel as if I couldn't breathe, then I've just got to get +back to the desert again." + +"Dancing is your expression," he said. "All of life is love and +expression." And now there was a falling note in his voice which her ear +was quick to catch. Almost she cried: + +"Love! And yet you live here alone!" + +"Yes," he went on, "we must have both. They are as necessary to us as +breath. Without them--" he stopped, evidently embarrassed, as if +suddenly aware that he had been talking more to himself than to her and +that in thus forgetting her, he had been more self-revealing than he +would have wished. + +She shook her head, plainly puzzled. "But you are young," she said, and +stole another glance at him, adding a little shyly, "at least not very +old, and I feel, I am sure that you too have a broken paw, but when that +is well you will go back to your own country, to cities again. You +couldn't stand it here always." + +He looked at her, an enigmatic smile on his lips. "Couldn't I?" he +said. Glancing again at her as he rose, he saw that she seemed weary, +her lashes lay long on her pale cheek. "Oh," with a touch of compunction +in his tone, "I have, as usual, talked far too much. You are tired and +we must go. José," lifting his voice, "as soon as you finish that game." + +"The Devil is indeed at your elbow," cried José, flinging down his +cards, "and prompts all you say. We have just this moment finished a +game and Gallito is the winner." + +Gallito smiled with bleak geniality. "Has José been wise?" he asked, +rising and replenishing the dying fire. + +"Fairly so," Seagreave smiled, "as far as he knows how to be. He has +been up to some of his antics, though. They are beginning to say that +this hillside is haunted." + +While Gallito talked to Seagreave and Mrs. Nitschkan and José argued +over certain rules of the game they had been playing, Mrs. Thomas sidled +up to Pearl and stood looking at her with the absorbed unconsciousness +of an admiring child. + +"I s'pose," she began, swaying back and forth bashfully and touching the +pink bow at her throat, "that it does look kind of queer to any one +that's so up on the styles as you are to see me wearing a pink bow at my +neck and a crêpe veil down my back?" + +Pearl looked up in wearied surprise. "It does seem queer," she said +indifferently. + +"'Course I know it ain't just citified," Mrs. Thomas hastened to +affirm; "but the veil and the bow together's got a meaning that I think +is real sweet." She waited a moment, almost pathetically anxious for +Pearl to see the symbolism of her two incongruous adornments, but her +listener was too genuinely bored and also too self-absorbed to make the +attempt. "It's this," said Mrs. Thomas, determined to explain. "The pink +bow kind o' shows that I'm in the world again and," bridling +coquettishly, "open to offers, while this crêpe veil shows that I ain't +forgot poor Seth in his grave and can afford to mourn for him right." + +But Pearl had not waited to hear all of these explanations. Without a +word to the rest of the parting guests, and with a mere inclination of +the head toward Seagreave, she had slipped away. + +Alone in her small, bare room, undressing by the light of a single +candle, the brief interest and curiosity which Seagreave had aroused in +her faded from her mind. For hours she lay sleepless upon her bed, +listening to the rushing mountain stream not far from the cabin, its +arrowy plunge and dash over the rocks softened by distance to a low, +perpetual purr, and hearing the mountain wind sigh through the pines +about the cabin: but not always did her great, dark eyes stare into the +blackness; sometimes she buried her head in the pillow and moaned, and +at last she wept, permitting herself the flood of tears that she had +held in check all day. "Rudolf, Rudolf," was the name upon her lips. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +Within a few days Hughie came up to Colina, and through the long, chilly +evenings near the peaks the little, isolated group met in Gallito's +cabin. It was understood in the village that Gallito did not care to +have his seclusion invaded, and this unspoken desire was universally +respected; indeed, it was not questioned. In the solitary places are +many eccentrics; they have escaped the melting pot of the city, and in +the freedom of the desert and the mountains have achieved an unfettered +and unquestioned individuality. + +Those who had business dealings with the old Spaniard knew that he was +to be found in places more easy of access than his lonely cabin among +the rocks and trees; at the mine, for instance, of which he was foreman, +the Mont d'Or; or, on an occasional Friday evening, in the village +saloon, where he mingled with the miners, engaging in the eternal and +interminable discussions of local mining affairs. He also kept a horse +in the village, a fiery, blooded creature, which he exercised every few +days, taking long rides over the various mountain trails. He was +universally respected, as his judgment of mines was known to be sound, +and his ventures unusually lucky; but no one was ever rash enough to +encroach upon the reserve which he invariably maintained. + +So, with small fear of embarrassing interruptions, although Gallito saw +that all prudence was observed and every precaution taken, he and José, +Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas sat over their cards, while Hughie played +upon the piano and Harry Seagreave listened, with his eyes closed, to +the music. He sometimes brought Pearl a cluster of the exquisite wild +flowers which now covered the mountains, but he rarely made any but the +briefest attempts at conversation with her, and after the first evening +she showed no disposition to have him do so. + +Instead of rousing from the depression which had overfallen her, she +seemed, for a time, to sink the more deeply into it. Silent, listless, +almost sullen, she passed her days. There was but little incentive for +her to go down into the village, and she took small interest in the +miners' wives who dwelt there. For a time she was curious to see Mrs. +Hanson, but, learning through Hughie that that lady lived up near her +mine on a mountainside two miles out of the village, and only +occasionally, and at irregular intervals, visited the camp, Pearl +realized the difficulties in the way of catching a glimpse of her and +contented herself with Bob Flick's description of her. + +Her mother wrote to her about once a week, brief, ill-spelled letters, +always with an ardent inclosure from Hanson, and Pearl would lie out on +the hillside during the long summer days reading, and re-reading them, +and at night she slept with them next her heart. For the first few +months Hanson was content to write to her and to extract what comfort he +could from her notes to her mother. These he invested with cryptic and +hidden meanings endeavoring to find a veiled message for himself in +every line. But presently, growing impatient, he began to beg her for a +word, only a word, but sent directly from her to him; yet, although the +summer had waned to autumn, she remained obdurate, her will and her +pride still stronger than her love. + +Sometimes in the evening Hugh would beg her to dance, but she always +refused. The desire for that spontaneous and natural form of expression +was gone from her; and once when Hugh had persisted in urging her, she +had left the room, nor appeared again all evening, so that it became a +custom not to mention her dancing to her. + +"Gosh a'mighty!" cried Mrs. Nitschkan robustly, looking up from a book +of flies over which she had been poring, "think of getting a man on the +brain like that." + +José, who had been putting away the supper dishes, assisted by Mrs. +Thomas, who had regarded the opportunity as propitious for certain +elephantine coquetries, stopped to regard the gypsy with that peering +mixture of amusement and curiosity which she ever evoked in him. + +"But, Nitschkan," he asked, "were you never crazy about a man?" + +"Marthy Thomas knows more about such goin's on than me," she returned +equably; "but since you ask me, I was crazy once about Jack, and another +awful pretty girl had him. But that wasn't all." She slapped her knee +in joyous and triumphant remembrance, and the cabin echoed with her +laughter. + +"Ah!" José hastily put away his last dish and sat cross-legged on the +hearth at her feet, looking up into her face with impish interest. "How +did you manage him or her?" + +"You can't manage a her no more'n you can manage a cat," bluntly. "You +can't make a cat useful, and you can't make it mind; but," +significantly, "you can manage a dog and train him, too. I had to learn +that girl that'd corraled Jack that a pretty face and ruffled petticoats +may catch a man, but they can't always hold him." + +"What can hold 'em?" interrupted Mrs. Thomas, sighing heavily. "Not +always vittles, and cert'ny not a loving heart." + +Mrs. Nitschkan snapped her book impatiently. "Now, Marthy, don't you +stir me up with that talk of yours, like men was the only prize packages +in life. I can't see what these home-body women love to fool 'emselves +so for. You're just like my Celora, Marthy. 'Mommie,' she says to me +once, 'I wonder when the right man'll come along and learn me to love +him?' Well, I happened to be makin' a dog whip jus' when she spoke, and +I says, 'Celora, if you give me much of that talk I'll give you a +hidin', big as you are. You got your man all picked out right now, and +you mean to marry him whether he thinks so or not, and he can't get away +from you no more'n a cat can from a mouse.'" + +"No more than I can from you," José sprang to his feet with light +agility and, leaning forward, made as if about to imprint a kiss upon +her forehead. + +But he had reckoned without his host. Mrs. Nitschkan's arm shot out +before he saw it, and he was sent staggering halfway across the room. "A +poor, perishin' brother tried that on me once," she remarked casually. +"It was in Willy Barker's drug store over to Mt. Tabor. Celora was with +me--she was about four--and I just set her down on the counter and said, +'Now, Celora, set good and quiet and watch Mommie go for the masher real +pretty.'" + +"I don't see why you got to be so rough on the boys, Sadie," deplored +Mrs. Thomas, rocking slowly back and forth in a large chair. "'Course we +know they're devils and all, but if it wasn't for their goin's on, +trying to snatch a kiss now and then, life would seem awful tame for us +poor, patient women. And even the worst of 'em's better'n none at all. +Look at me! I had the luck to get a cross-grained, cranky one, as you +know. Poor Seth!" She drew a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her +eyes. "But you got to admit, Sadie, that even he was white enough to up +and die before I got too old for other gentlemen to take notice of me." + +"What'd you want 'em to take notice of you for?" asks Mrs. Nitschkan +abstractedly, her mind on her flies. + +"It's easy enough for you to talk that way," Mrs. Thomas spoke with some +heat. "You got the what-you-may-callems--accomplishments--that gets +their notice. You're apt to skin 'em at cards, you can easy out-shoot +'em, and there ain't a lady miner in the mountains that can pass off a +salted property as cute as you." + +"What's the use of livin' in a world of tenderfoots if you don't use +'em?" growled Mrs. Nitschkan. + +"'Course. And don't think I'm blaming you, Sadie; I ain't." Mrs. Thomas +spoke more gently. "All I'm sayin' is that you can't understand the +women that's born feeling the need of a strong right arm to lean on, and +has nothing but a nice complexion and a loving heart to offer. The +game's a hard one for them, 'cause there're so many others in the field. +It ain't always a complexion; sometimes it's a head of hair, or eyes, +but whatever it is, competition's keen. I leave it to you, Mr. José, if +a lady can say to a gentleman the first time she meets him, 'I got a +dandy temper,' or 'I can bake a pie that'll coax the coyotes down from +the hills.' No, you got to let the hair or complexion do its work first +and sort o' insinuate the rest as acquaintance grows." + +"There's a man comin' up here to-morrow, Marthy, but he won't know +whether you got a strand of hair or a tooth in your head; he'll never +see you." + +"Maybe he can't help it--not if I stand right in his way," said Mrs. +Thomas, with a coy glance from under her lashes at José. + +"Oh, yes, he can," returned Mrs. Nitschkan. "No matter who's in the way +he can't see but one person, and that's that sulky Pearl; for it's good +old Bob Flick, one of the best ever." + +Two or three times Bob Flick had come up and remained several days, and +on these occasions Pearl had roused somewhat from her indifference to +life. On his last visit, late in September, he had succeeded in +persuading her to ride again, and had sent down to the desert for a +horse for her. She would not admit at first that she enjoyed being in +the saddle again, but to his unexpressed satisfaction it was obvious +that she did. + +The crystalline, amber air was like wine; the mountains were a mosaic of +color; the trees burned red and yellow, glowing torches of autumn, and +accentuating all their ephemeral and regal splendor; among them, yet +never of them, were the green austere pines marching in their serried +ranks, on, on up the hillsides to timber line. + +One day, as Pearl and Flick rode among the hills, a flood of sunlight +falling about them, crimson and yellow leaves blowing on the wind, she +expressed, for the first time, an interest in the desert and a desire to +see it again. + +"I'll have to go back sometime, Bob, I suppose," she said, "if it's only +to see Lolita." + +"I nearly brought her up with me," he said. "I thought maybe she'd stand +it all right for a day or two; then I got afraid she'd sicken right away +in this rare air, and I didn't dare." + +"I guess so," sighed Pearl; "but, goodness! I'd sure like to see her +again. I'd most give anything to hear her say, 'mi jasmin, Pearl, mi +corazon.'" + +"We understand each other, you and me and Lolita," returned Flick. "We +all got the South in us, I reckon that's why." + +"Maybe," she answered. "Yes, I'd like to see Lolita and mother. She +won't leave her chickens and melons and sweet potatoes and all long +enough to come up here, and, oh, there's times when I feel like I'd most +give my eyes to see the desert again; but I couldn't stand it yet, Bob, +not yet." + +A shade had fallen over her face as she spoke and, to divert her, he +began to speak of José. "Doesn't he make you laugh?" he asked. "He keeps +everybody else on the broad grin." + +"Men," she said scornfully. "I think he works a charm on you that you +all put yourselves in danger for a thing like that. Sometimes he makes +me laugh--a little; but if I had my way I would waste no time in putting +him in prison where he belongs. What is it you see in him?" + +"I don't believe women do like José much," reflected Flick. + +"Except Nitschkan," replied Pearl. "She says she's trying to reform him +and save his soul; but it mostly consists in getting him to do all the +odd jobs she can think of, and Mrs. Thomas is trying to flirt with him." + +"I guess you don't like him, because you don't see him as he is," +ruminated Bob Flick. "He's not afraid of anything; he'll take chances, +just without thinking of them, that I don't believe another man on earth +would. He's always good-natured and amusing, and look how he can cook, +Pearl," turning in his saddle, "just think of that! Why, he could take +a piece of sole leather and make it taste like venison." + +But even this list of perfections failed to arouse any enthusiasm for +José in Pearl, or to convince her that the proper place for him was not +within the sheltering walls of a prison. + +"Well, if you don't care much for José, how about Seagreave?" There was +a touch of anxiety in his glance as he asked this question. The jealousy +which he could never succeed in overcoming, and yet of which he was +continually ashamed, bit like acid into his heart as he thought of +Seagreave's fair youthfulness; the charm of his long, clear, blue eyes; +the winning sweetness of his nature. + +Pearl drew her brows together a little, her eyes gloomed through her +long, silky, black lashes. "I don't like queer people," she said +petulantly. "He always seems to be mooning about something, and most of +the time he acts like you weren't on the earth." An expression of +surprise and resentment grew upon her face and darkened it. Then, with a +gesture of annoyance, she threw up her head, dismissing the subject from +her mind. A vision of Hanson rose before her and her heart turned to the +memory of his ruddy good looks, his gay, bold eyes, his magnetic +vitality. + +"Say, Bob," she began, a little hesitatingly, "does that Mrs. Hanson +still live around here?" + +He nodded. "I got a letter from her the other day. She wanted me to +attend to a little mining business down in the desert. She's pretty +shrewd in business, too." + +"Why couldn't she attend to her own business?" asked Pearl sharply. +"What's she bothering you, a stranger, for?" + +"Because her father died not long ago and she inherited some property +and she's got to go East to see about it. I shouldn't wonder if she's +already started." + +She repressed a sudden start and looked quickly at him, but he was +gazing out over the ranges and did not see her, which, she reflected, +was an excellent thing, considering the wild and daring idea which had +flashed across her mind. If Hanson but knew that his wife had left +Colina no power on earth could prevent him from immediately journeying +thither. Should she mention the fact in a letter to her mother? She +debated this for a day or two, the temptation to do so was almost +overmastering, but her pride finally triumphed in the struggle, and she +left the matter on the knees of the gods. + +Yet, in the depths of her wild heart, she knew that he would come, that +he must long have awaited just such an opportunity, and she had no doubt +that he kept himself informed of the movements of the woman who bore his +name. Her spirits rose in the contemplation of glorious moments when she +should live to the full again, when she should feel herself to be as a +quickened and soaring flame of passion and intrigue. And what an +opportunity! Her father was down at the Mont d'Or all day. Hughie, of +course, was about most of the time, but she would not meet Hanson in the +cabin, but out in the golden October weather among the pines. Bob Flick +was returning to the desert the next day, so she had nothing to fear +from him. + +Several days, almost a week, passed, and then a letter from Hanson, +telling her of Mrs. Hanson's departure, and assuring her that he meant +to come to Colina, that he would not stop to consider any risks he might +be taking, and that he was equally indifferent to her possible +prohibition. He was coming, coming on the morning train the next +Thursday, and this was Saturday. + +She drew a long breath and pressed the letter to her heart. She would +never yield to him, never; not so long as that barrier to a marriage +between himself and herself--Mrs. Hanson--remained a legal wall between +them, but, oh! if she was to live, she must see him now and again, at +long, long intervals; but nevertheless occasionally. + +The listless melancholy of months fell from her, and those about her, +noting the change, laid it to Bob Flick's influence and to the fact that +she was almost continually in the saddle; also Hughie and Gallito +congratulated themselves that she was speedily forgetting Hanson. Her +whole demeanor had changed, she even condescended to banter José, and +she took his jibes in good part; and in the evenings when José and +Gallito, Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas, had sat down to the silence of +their cards, and Hughie played softly on the piano in a dim corner, she +talked to Seagreave; in fact, their conversations became more prolonged +every evening. + +One morning, a few days before Hanson arrived, she had chosen to stroll +up the mountainside, instead of riding as usual. Absorbed in her glowing +anticipations, she had walked almost above timber line, then, presently, +just as she realized that she was growing tired, the trail had led her +to an ideal and natural resting place, a little chamber of ease. It was +an open space where the pine needles lay thick upon the ground, so thick +that Pearl's feet sank deeply into them as she entered. All about it +were gnarled and stunted pine trees, bent and twisted by the high +mountain winds, until they appeared as strange, Japanese silhouettes +against the deep, blue sky. It was delightfully warm here, where the sun +fell so broadly, and Pearl threw herself down upon the pine needles. The +wind sighed softly through the forest, barely penetrating her retreat, +and finally, under the spell of the soft and dreamy atmosphere, she fell +asleep. After a time she wakened, and slowly opening her eyes saw to her +surprise that Seagreave was sitting a few feet away from her. He held a +book in his hand, but he was not reading, neither was he looking at her, +but out through a break in the trees at innumerable blue ranges, +floating, unsubstantial as mist in a flood of sunshine. + +She sat up, and he, hearing her move, turned quickly and met her eyes. + +"I came here to read," he said, in smiling explanation. "I often come, +and, seeing you here and asleep, I thought perhaps you wouldn't mind if +I stayed and kept away the bears and mountain lions." + +She was still a little dazed. "Why, why," rubbing her eyes, "I must +have been asleep. It is so pleasant here." + +He turned quickly. "You find it pleasant?" he said, "then the mountains +must be beginning to exert their spell upon you." + +"I don't know," she answered slowly; "I don't hate them like I used to; +but I'll never really care for them. I love the desert." + +"You must tell me what you find in the desert," he said. She looked out +broodingly at the ranges, the strange sphynx look in her eyes, but she +did not answer him. At last she withdrew her gaze from the hills and +glanced rather contemptuously at the book in his hands. "Don't you ever +work?" she asked abruptly. "You're a man." + +"Sometimes I work down in the mines, if I want to," he replied +carelessly; "but I rarely want to. Sometimes, too, I write a little." + +"But don't you want to work all the time with your hands or your head, +like other men do?" she persisted. + +"No," he returned. "To what profit would it be?" There was just a trace +of bitterness in his voice. + +"But you are strong and a man," she spoke now with unveiled scorn. "You +wouldn't be content always to sit up in a mountain cabin by the fire +like an old woman." + +"Wouldn't I?" he asked. "Why not?" The bitterness was more apparent now, +and a shadow had fallen over his face. Pearl realized that, for the +moment, at least, he had forgotten her presence, and in truth, his mind +had traveled back over the years and he was living over again the +experience which had made him a wanderer on the earth and finally a +recluse in the lonely and isolated mountains. + +It was a more or less conventional story. All events which penetrate +deeply into human experience are. They are vital and living, because +universal; therefore we call them conventional. Seagreave had been left +an orphan at an early age, and as he inherited wealth and was born of a +line of gentlemen and scholars who had given the world much of service +in their day, his material environment offered him no obstacles to be +overcome. There were no barriers between him and any normal desires and +ambitions, nothing to excite his emulation with suggestions that there +were forbidden and therefore infinitely desirable gardens in which he +might wander a welcome guest. But life sets a premium on hard knocks. It +is usually the bantling which is cast upon the rocks who wins most of +the prizes, having acquired in a hard school powers of resistance and +endurance. + +Seagreave's pleasant experiences continued through youth into manhood. +When quite young he became engaged to a charming girl about his own age +whom his guardians considered eminently suitable. Among many +friendships, he had one so congenial that he fancied no circumstance +could arise which could strain or break this tie. + +And then, on the very eve of his marriage, his sweetheart had eloped +with this friend of his boyhood, and he had not only this wound of the +heart to endure, but also the consciousness that he was pilloried as a +blind fool by all of his acquaintances. + +Consequently he had, in his first young bitterness and heartbreak, taken +a sort of gloomy satisfaction in living remote from his fellow beings +and burying himself in the wilds, ever strengthening his capacity to do +without the ordered and cultivated life of which he had been a part, and +which had seemed essential to his well-being; and he had no +disillusionizing past experiences to teach him the philosophy that time +assuages all griefs, and that it is the part of common sense to take +life as you find it. + +Gradually his new manner of living, of wandering whither he would +without ties or responsibilities, became a habit to him. He lost +interest in the world of achievement as well as in the world of manners, +but so insidious was this change, this shifting of the point of view, +that he had never fully realized it until now when, in some way, some +indefinite, goading and not altogether pleasant way, Pearl was bringing +a faint realization of his acquired habit of mind home to him. + +As Pearl watched him and wondered what remembrance it was that clouded +his face, her interest in him increased. "I wonder--" she said, and +hesitated. + +Her words recalled him to himself immediately; with a little gesture of +impatience as if annoyed at his own weakness, he put from him these +morbid memories of the past. "You wonder--what?" he asked. + +She flushed slightly at the thought that he might think her guilty of an +intrusive curiosity, but she could not stop now. She must know more. +Her craving intelligence demanded some explanation. "José," she said +doubtfully and almost involuntarily. + +A smile of pure amusement rippled about his mouth. "Yes," he said, +"José. What about him?" + +Speech came readily enough to her now. "You know what José is," +accusingly. "You know the big reward that is offered for him, and yet +you keep him in your cabin and treat him almost like a brother." + +"Quite like a brother," he said; "why not? Who would have the heart to +put Pan in prison? Do you think shutting José up behind bars would make +him any better? At any rate, he is safe to do no mischief here, and he +is happy. Would you want us to give him up?" + +"I!" She looked at him in surprise and shook her head. "But then we are +different, my father and me. He likes bad company, and I guess I take +after him. But you, they call you Saint Harry, you are respectable." + +"Not I," he said earnestly; "you must not accuse me of such things. Look +yonder at that long mountain trail, leading up to the peaks. There are +mile-stones in it. So it is in life. When we have stopped trying to make +people measure up to our standard we have passed one; when we have gone +beyond forgiveness and learned that there is never anything to forgive +we have passed another, and when we have ceased from all condemnation we +have progressed a little farther." + +She made no response to this. In that sunwarmed silence the wind +whispered softly through the pines, a sound like the monotonous, musical +murmur of distant seas. "But you will forget all that," she said +suddenly. "You will go back to the world. I know." + +He smiled invincibly. "How do you know?" + +She tapped her breast lightly with her jewel-encrusted hand. "From +myself. Oh, how I have hated life since I came here, but now I love it +again, I want it." She threw wide her arms and smiled radiantly, but not +at him, rather at the vision of life her imagination conjured. "I want +to dance, dance, dance, I want to live." + +"And you will dance for us here in the mountains before you go away?" he +asked, with interest. "Good dancing is very rare and very beautiful. +There are very few great dancers." + +"Yes, only a few," she said briefly. He could not know that she was one +of them, of course, but nevertheless it piqued her vanity that he did +not divine it or take it for granted. She resolved then and there to +show him how she could dance, and as she decided this, a subtle, wicked +smile crept about her lips. Since he was so sure that he would never +return to the world, the world should come to him. + +"But you haven't said yet that you would dance for us," he said. + +"Yes," the same smile still lingering in her eyes and on her lips, "yes, +I will. The camp have sent half a dozen invitations for me to do so, +through Hughie. They have a dance once a week in the town hall, don't +they? When is the next one?" + +"I think I heard Hughie say next Thursday night. He always helps out +the orchestra when he is here, doesn't he?" + +Next Thursday night! Her eyes widened. That was the evening of the day +that Rudolf was coming. Perhaps--perhaps, he would stay over and see +her, it was not much of a risk he would be taking in doing so. Her +father would not go down to see her dance, he would prefer to sit over +his cards with José, and no one else knew Hanson. Oh, what a prospect! +She almost clapped her hands with joy. + +The wind sent a shower of pine needles over them, and Seagreave looked +up, scanning the sky with a keen glance. "It will soon be time for the +snow to fly," he said. + +She looked at him incredulously. "Why, it is mild as summer." + +"Yes, but this is October, and October in the mountains. Perhaps in only +a few days now the ground will all be covered with snow." + +"I hope I shall be away before that time," shivering a little. + +"But think what you will miss. Think how beautiful it will be; all +still, just a great, white silence; the snow with its wonderful shadows, +and sometimes, when the air is very clear, I seem to hear the chiming of +great bells." + +She shivered again and rose. "I don't believe I'd like it," she said. "I +think it would frighten me." + +He walked down the hill with her to Gallito's cabin, but on their way +they spoke little. Her mind was full of Hanson's coming, and of the +revelation of dancing which she meant to show him and, incidentally, +Saint Harry. It was not until later in the day that she remembered how +impersonal, according to her standards, her conversation with Seagreave +had been. Not once, either by word or look had he told her that she was +beautiful and to be desired. A new experience for her; never before had +she encountered such an attitude in any man. It must be, therefore, that +there was some other woman in his life; but where? Certainly not here in +Colina or she would have heard of it, and he had been in the mountains +two years without leaving them. Surely he, too, must have known +unhappiness in love. At intervals during the day she built up various +hypotheses explaining the circumstances of his grief, and she also let +her imagination dwell upon the woman, picturing her appearance and +wondering about her disposition. + +That evening at supper she arranged with Hugh that she was to accept the +standing invitation of the camp, and that she would dance for them the +following Thursday evening, and with an entire return of enthusiasm +talked music and different steps to him until José and Mrs. Thomas, +rendered more expeditious even than usual by their interest in the +topic, had cleared away all traces of the meal and moved the table back +against the wall. Then Hugh began to play. + +"Wait a minute," Pearl cried to him, "until I get my dancing slippers +and my _manton de Manila_." She vanished through the doorway leading to +her room and reappeared presently, a fan in her hand and a gorgeous +fringed, silken shawl thrown about her; it was white and embroidered in +flowers of all colors. "Ready," she called over her shoulder to Hugh. + +Then she also began, but not at once to dance; instead, she executed a +series of postures; almost without apparent transition she melted from +one pose to another of plastic grace, her body the mere, boneless, +obedient servant of her directing will. + +These she followed with some wonderfully rapid exercises. Sometimes she +stood perfectly still and one saw only the marvelous play of her body +muscles, plainly visible, as no corsets had ever fettered her unmatched +lines. Again, holding the body motionless, she moved only the arms, now +with a slow and alluring rhythm, and again with incredible rapidity, +showing to the full the flexibility and liquidity of the wrist movements +for which she was later to be so famous. Then holding the body and arms +quite still she danced only with her legs, and then arms, legs, body +married in a faultless rhythm, she whirled like a cyclone about the +room. + +Her father and José sat and smoked and watched her every movement with +keen, critical eyes. Were they not Spaniards who had danced all through +their childhood and youth, as naturally as they breathed? About +Gallito's mouth played the bleak smile which in him betokened content, +while José could barely wait for her to finish her preliminary exercises +before he besought her to let him join her. Even Mrs. Nitschkan laid +down some fishing tackle with which she was engrossed and Mrs. Thomas +looked on admiringly and half jealously. + +"Dios," cried José plaintively, "Hughie's music invites me, even if the +Señorita does not." + +Pearl smiled complaisantly upon him. "The Jota!" she said, and +immediately he joined her, making no bad second. Together they danced +until Seagreave came down from his cabin, and then, flushed and +laughing, she flung herself into a chair and refused to go on, although +he begged her to do so. + +"Say, Sadie," breathed Mrs. Thomas, "don't you believe I could learn to +do that?" + +"No," returned her friend, looking up from an earnest contemplation of +various hooks, "I don't believe that no woman that's been married and +had children and sorrows and buried a husband and is as heavy as a +hippopotamus, and stumbles and interferes with both feet like Mis' +Evans's old horse, Whitey, can learn something where the trick of it is +keepin' up in the air most of the time." + +"You needn't hurt a person's feelings by being so harsh." Mrs. Thomas's +eyes filled with tears. "Oh, jus' take in Mr. Seagreave," she whispered; +"I haven't seen him look at a lady that way yet." + +"Cert'ny not at you. He ain't seem' no miner's wives," returned Mrs. +Nitschkan cruelly. + +"Father," cried Pearl joyously to Gallito, "I have lost nothing. I am +not even tired, nor stiff. If anything, I am better than ever. Isn't it +so? No," as Seagreave still continued to urge José and her to dance, +"no," she lifted her narrow, glittering eyes to his, all the old +challenge in them again, the pale coffee stains beneath them had +deepened, her cheeks held the flush of a crimson rose, "not until +Thursday night, then I shall dance the desert for you, and not alone the +desert," she flashed her man-compelling, provocative smile straight into +his eyes, "I shall bring the world to you, and then you will find how +tired you are of these old mountains." + +He smiled at her serenely, remotely, as one of the high gods might have +smiled upon a lovely, earthly Bacchante. What had the vain and fleeting +world to offer him who had so long ignored it? + +Then, while Hugh still continued to play, Seagreave followed her to a +shadowy seat near a window, whither she had withdrawn to be out of the +warmth of the fire, and together they sat there talking until the moon +dropped behind the mountain. + +José, having finished his game of cards with Gallito and the two women, +who had now left the table and were examining Pearl's _manton de +Manila_, sent his twinkling, darting glance in their direction. +"Caramba!" he cried softly, "but she has the sal Andaluz, she can dance! +I have seen many, but not such another." And then he crossed his arms +and bent his body over them and rocked back and forth in soundless and +apparently inexhaustible mirth in which Gallito finally joined him. + +"I don't know what you are laughing at, José," he said; "but it is very +funny." + +"I laugh that the Devil has chosen you as an instrument, my Francisco," +he said. + +"Because I give you shelter?" asked Gallito, lighting another +cigarette. + +"Because the Devil schemes always how he can lure Saint Harry from his +ice peak. He has not succeeded with cards, nor with wine, nor even with +me, for I have tried to tempt him to plan with me those little robberies +which for amusement I dream of, here in these damnable solitudes. But +before he was a saint he had a wild heart, had Harry. You have but to +look at him to know that. Have you forgotten that he has not always +lived in these mountains? Do you not recall that he was middle-weight +champion of Cape Colony, that he was a scout all through the Boer war? +That he also saw service in India and has certain decorations to show +for it? Saint Harry! ha, ha, ha! + +"The one thing he could not resist was any kind of a mad adventure, all +the chances against him and all the hounds on top of him, and he pitting +his wits against them and scheming to outwit them. A petticoat could +never hold him. Oh, yes," in answer to Gallito's upraised brows, "there +have been one or two, here and there, but they meant little to him, as +any one might see. But, as you know and I know, Gallito, the Devil often +wins by persistence; he never gives up. So, although Saint Harry's case +is a puzzling one, the Devil is not discouraged. He looks about him and +says, 'My friend, Gallito, my old and tried friend, has a daughter, +beautiful as a flower, graceful as a fountain. I will bring her here and +then Saint Harry will scramble off his ice peak fast enough.'" + +"Your foolish wits run away with you," growled Gallito. + +"My legs must run away with me now," said José, rising and stretching +his arms and yawning. "But tell me first why was your daughter sad when +she first came here?" + +"Because she had fallen in love with a damned rascal," said Gallito +bitterly, "after the manner of women." + +"After the manner of women," José nodded, and whispered behind his hand, +so that the two mountain ladies might not overhear him. "Believe it or +not, many have loved me. But women like extremes, too; if they love +rascals, they also adore saints. They see the saint standing there in +his niche, so calm, so peaceful and composed, entirely forgetful of +them, and this they cannot endure. Their brains are on fire; they spend +their time scheming and planning how they can claw him down from his +pedestal. They burn candles and pray to all the saints in Paradise to +help them, and they offer hostages to the Devil, too. They do not really +know the difference between devil and angel or between good and bad; but +they cannot bear it that the saint is indifferent to them. That is +something that drives them mad. Ah, it is a strong saint that can stand +firm in his niche against their wiles." + +"It is an experience that you will never suffer from, José." + +"But who can say?" exclaimed José, and speaking with gravity. "Some day +I shall devote myself to good works and to making my peace with the +church, and who knows, I may yet be a saint. But one thing I am sure +of, I shall never leave my niche for a woman." + +"You know nothing, José." + +"I know that I will never waste my cooking on a woman. I will enter a +monastery of fat monks first and cook for them. They will appreciate it. +But to return to Saint Harry and your daughter now--" + +"Come," said Gallito harshly, pushing back his chair, "it is time you +went home. The ladies," indicating Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas, who +had been getting on their capes and hoods, "are waiting for you to +escort them." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +As the day drew near upon which Pearl expected to meet Hanson again all +things seemed, as if by some special arrangement with the Fates, to +accommodate themselves to her plans. She had intended to ask Seagreave +for the use of his private parlor among the pines, intimating that she +desired to retire thither to practice some new steps, and, lo! the night +before, after discussing weather probabilities with her father and José, +he had decided to spend the greater part of the day in the village +laying in a full stock of winter provisions. + +Hughie also would be in the village, making arrangements for the event +of the evening and seeing that the piano was properly installed and +tuned. Gallito would of course be at the Mont d'Or, and as for José, he +had announced his intention of assisting Mrs. Thomas in the making of +some delicate and elaborate cakes, difficult of composition and of which +Pearl was especially fond, and also of constructing certain delicious +pastries. No one could think of José as merely cooking; the results of +his genius justified the use of such high-sounding words as "composing" +or "constructing." Thus, his morning would be fully occupied. + +Propitious Fates! Her pathway was smoothed before her; yet, alas! such +is the perversity of the human mind, that as the morning dawned, as the +minutes ticked themselves away on the clock, as the hour drew near when +she should again meet Hanson, after all these months of separation, her +spirit grew heavier instead of lighter. There was a return of +listlessness and an indifference to his coming which constantly +increased. She even felt indifferent to her own appearance. + +At last, reluctantly, she threw a lace scarf about her head and, +wrapping a long, crimson cloak about her, she left the cottage and took +her way slowly up the hill. + +As it was yet far too early for her rendezvous she turned aside from the +main road and followed the narrow mountain trail which led to the cabin +occupied by Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas. The gypsy, in her usual +careless, almost masculine attire, stood in the door of her cabin gazing +out at the mountains in all their mellow and triumphant glory, the +evanescent glory of late autumn. A pick and fishing rod lay across the +door sill and a lean, flea-bitten dog dozed at her feet. Her arms were +akimbo and a pipe was thrust between her teeth. + +Her quick ear caught the sound of Pearl's approach and suddenly her +blue, twinkling gaze dropped from the hills to the trail which led to +her door. Seeing who her visitor was, a smile of blended curiosity and +welcome crossed her face. "Howdy, Pearl," she called jovially, "come and +set a spell." She removed the pick and fishing rod and dragged the dog +out of the way. Through the open doorway Mrs. Thomas and José might be +seen in the room beyond, bending over a table, evidently deeply +engrossed in the composition of some cakes. + +"I can only stay a minute; I got a notion to walk this morning." There +was a cool deviltry in the slanting gaze with which she surveyed the +other woman. + +"Seagreave, I'll bet," returned Mrs. Nitschkan frankly. "It ain't in +either you or Marthy Thomas to let a man alone. What possesses you, +anyway?" + +Pearl continued to regard her with that subtle, burning, mocking look. +"Your kind can never know," she taunted. + +"Mebbe," said Mrs. Nitschkan laconically, "but you're different from +Marthy. She's just mush. She'll be thinkin' now that she's cracked about +José. If it wasn't him it would be your father, and if there wasn't no +man up here at all, she'd hoist that crêpe veil on her head, stick a red +or blue bow at her neck and go swingin' down to camp, tryin' to persuade +herself an' me that all she went for was a package of tea or some bacon. +But you're different, always a yellin' about bein' free and yet always a +tryin' to get tangled up." + +Again Pearl laughed wickedly. "You tramp woman! Why would you rather +hunt bear or mountain lions than shoot squirrels? Because there's danger +in it." She laughed mirthlessly. "I guess it's for the same reason that +I got to hunt the biggest game there is--man, and he hunts me." + +Mrs. Nitschkan relighted her pipe. "Bob Flick's your best bet," she +remarked impersonally. + +"Talk about guns and fishing rods and dogs, something you know about," +said Pearl scornfully, touching the dozing dog lightly with her foot. He +growled angrily, resenting the liberty. + +"You better leave Flip alone," cautioned Mrs. Nitschkan; "he's liable to +bite anybody but me. Always be kind to dumb animals, 'specially cross +dogs. And, say, Pearl, I been running the cards this morning. It was +such a dandy day that I didn't know whether I'd do some assessment work +or spend the day fishin'; the cards decided in favor of fishin'. I had +to get some light so's I could tell how to go ahead. How any one can get +along without a pack of cards! It's sure a lamp to the feet. If you wait +a minute I'll run 'em for you." + +She vanished inside and returned immediately with a board and a +well-worn pack of cards. These she shuffled and, after Pearl had cut +them several times, she began to lay them out in neat rows on the board +on her knee, uttering a strange, crooning sound the while and studying +each card as it fell with the most absorbed interest. + +"Um-mmm!" with a heavy sigh and shaking her head forebodingly. "You +better go home, girl, as fast as you can and shut yourself up in the +cabin all day. Did you ever see anything like that?" pointing to the +cards. "Trouble, trouble, nothin' but trouble. If it ain't actual murder +an' death, it's too near it to be any joke. Look how them spades turns +up every whipstitch. How can folks doubt!" + +But the cards of evil omen lying there on the board before had roused +all of Pearl's inherent superstition and stirred her swift anger against +Mrs. Nitschkan. "Parrot-croaker!" she exclaimed angrily, and followed +this with a string of Spanish oaths and expletives. "Trouble is over for +me." + +Mrs. Nitschkan was on her feet in a minute. The board and the cards fell +unheeded to the ground. Her small, quick eyes began to roll ominously +and show red, and her relaxed figure became immediately tense and alert +as that of a panther on guard. + +"Trouble's just beginnin' for you," her voice was a mere guttural growl. +"A little more sass from you, you double-j'inted jumpin'-jack dancer, +and I'll jerk you to the edge of that cliff yonder and throw you down. +I'm feelin' particularly good right now," rolling up her sleeves and +showing the great knots of swelling muscles on her arms. "Get out of my +way." + +With one big sweep of her arm she brushed her companion aside as if she +had been a fly; but with incredible rapidity Pearl recovered herself and +sprang directly before her. + +"Then get me out," she taunted, "try it, try it. I'd slip through your +fingers like oil. It's no good to flash your over-sized man-muscles on +me; I'm made of whip-cord and whalebone. Do you get that?" + +Mrs. Nitschkan's courage sprang from a sense of trained and responsive +muscles and of tremendous physical strength, but at the sound of that +cool voice, those mocking, unwavering eyes, there swept over her an awe +of the slighter woman's far higher courage. It was an almost +superstitious fear and respect which chilled the hot blood of her +passion, the instinctive obedience of the flesh to the indomitable +spirit. Reluctantly, against her will and in spite of her anger, the +fighting gipsy paid deference to the steel-like, unflinching quality of +the Pearl, when, rising above her slender physique, she faced unafraid +the brute strength which threatened her, and dominated the situation by +sheer consciousness of power. + +The gypsy, chilled and subdued, confused by forces she could not +understand, fell back a step or two and Pearl seized this opportunity to +slip away, calling a careless good-by over her shoulder. + +But the depression which had touched her from the time she wakened now +lay heavier on her spirit. Her mind reverted to the cards of ill omen +and she shivered with a faint chill of apprehension. And as she walked +on it seemed to her that the atmosphere was in tune with her mood. + +The air was soft, and yet sharp enough to quicken the color in her +cheeks, but still indefinably wistful. The song of the wind among the +pines, that mountain wind which never ceases to blow, had a sort of +sighing pensiveness in its falling cadences. The deep, blue sky dreamed +over the russet tree tops and the yellow leaves filled the forest with +their flying gold. + +And the spirit of the year seemed to have entered into Pearl. She was as +wistful as the day, as pensive as the sighing wind. She arrived early at +her destination. The sun lay warm in her little bower of encircling +pines and she sat down on a fallen log to await Hanson's coming. He +could not take her by surprise for, through a little opening in the +trees, she could see the trail, it was in plain view. + +Sitting down then to wait, she rested her elbow on her knee and her chin +in the palm of her hand. It seemed as if the power of anticipation were +gone from her. She wondered dully at her own languor, not only of body, +but of mind. In a few moments she would see again the man whom she had +passionately loved, and in parting from whom she had not dreamed it to +be within human possibility so to suffer, and yet, at the prospect of +meeting him again, her heart throbbed not one beat faster. She could not +even look forward to dancing that night with any excitement or pleasure. +She wondered what Seagreave would think of her when he saw her; she +would be a vision far more brilliant than any spirit of the autumn +woods, and she would wear her emeralds again, the emeralds for which Bob +Flick had squandered a fortune. She put up her hand and touched them +where they hung about her neck, concealed under her gown, for she wore +them night and day, never allowing them to leave her person. Good old +Bob! Seagreave had said there were only a few great dancers. Well, she +would show him. She could dance; no matter how critical he was, he would +have to admit that. And then her heart seemed suddenly to run down with +a queer, cold little thrill. + +There was Hanson ascending the trail. He was only a few feet away, and +even as she jumped to her feet he saw her and waved his hand. He paused +a moment for breath and then hurried on. + +"Pearl!" he cried, and caught her in his arms, covering her face with +kisses and crushing her against his heart. It seemed hours to her, but +it was really only a moment before she pushed him from her, slipped from +his arms, and stood panting and flushed before him. + +"Pearl, O Pearl!" he cried again, and would once more have caught her +deftly to him, but again she slipped from him. "Sit down," she cried +petulantly, motioning to the fallen log. "You're out of breath, you've +had a long climb." She herself sat down and he followed her example, +encircling her with his arms; a tiny frown showed itself in her forehead +and she bent slightly forward as if to evade his clasp, folding her arms +about her knees. + +"Gee! You bet it was a climb," he said, wiping his brow and still +breathing a little hard. "But I'd have climbed right on up to heaven if +you'd been there waiting for me. Lord, Pearl! if I'd had to wait much +longer to see you it would have finished me, I do believe. Oh, +sweetheart, you're lovelier than ever, and you're not going to punish +either of us any more, I can tell you that. You're coming down with me +and we're going to live, Pearl, live, just as I told you we would, down +there in the palms in the desert. Now I'm telling you again among the +pines, and this time you're going to listen and come. I guess we've both +of us pretty well found out that it's no use our trying to live apart +any longer." + +Her crimson cloak had fallen from her shoulders, and Hanson, holding her +hand in his, had pushed up her sleeve and was kissing her arm, as he +talked, up as far as her elbow and down again to the tips of her +fingers. She did not even attempt to draw her hand away, she was still +in that state of apathy, where all her senses seemed dulled; and so she +let him babble on, murmuring his adoration and his rose-colored dreams +of the future. + +"By George!" he exclaimed, in sheer, sincere amazement. "To think of +you, the Black Pearl, spending all these months up here in these dead +old mountains without even a moving-picture show to look at. You got an +awful will, girl." + +She gazed with somber eyes beyond him. Life, did he say "life"? That was +what she asked, what she demanded, life as glorious and as rich in color +as a full-blown rose. And only a little while ago she had dreamed that +she could find it with him, that _that_ was what he offered to her. She +remembered the question that Harry Seagreave had asked her. "What does +life mean to you?" Ah, since that first night in the mountains life +seemed to have expanded into infinite horizons before her widening +vision. She dreamed over them, forgetful for the moment of the man +beside her, until he, turning in the full tide of his talk, pressed his +lips ardently, passionately to hers. + +Taken by surprise, she uttered one of her fluent Spanish oaths and, +springing to her feet, stood with her body slightly bent forward, her +hands on her hips, gazing at him with her narrow, gleaming eyes. Her +apathy was gone, she was alive now to her finger tips. + +He rose, too. "Honey, what is it?" he questioned dazedly. "What's got +you now?" + +"Don't touch me," she said tensely. "Don't dare to touch me." + +He looked at her unbelievingly and then fell back a pace or two. "My +Lord! What's the matter with you?" he cried. + +"I don't know," she muttered wildly. Her eyes still measured him, his +bold, obvious good looks, his ruddy self-complacency, his habitual and +shallow geniality, the satisfied vanity of a mouth steadily becoming +looser; the depiction of years of self-indulgence in the little veins on +his highly colored cheeks; the sagging lines of his well-set-up figure, +ever taking on more flesh. + +So she saw him, not perhaps as he was, but in the light of her own harsh +and unmodified criticism, and mercilessly she reflected upon him all the +scorn she felt for herself. She did not consider or even remember that +with what strength of affection he possessed he had loved her; that, +after his constitution he had given her of his best, all he had to give, +in fact; that for her he had more than once faced danger, and just to +see her again was even now facing it, fearlessly. + +He had grown to expect from her an infinite variety of moods, but +something in her pose, her expression, frightened him now. "Honey, what +are you driving at?" he asked, a little tremulously, and stretched out +his hand to lay it on her shoulder. + +But again an oath whipped from her lips, her glance darkened. She drew +back from him with the horse-shoe frown showing plainly on her forehead. + +He looked at her, his whole face broken up, his mouth trembling, +something like tears in his eyes. "Why, Pearl," he faltered, "ain't you +glad to see me? Why, here I been waiting all these damned, dreary +months, never thinking of any one but you, never even looking at another +woman, just dreaming of the moment when I could put my arms around you +again and know that you loved me and were mine." + +A hard and bitter smile showed on her mouth. "Yours! Loved you!" she +cried. "My God! You!" + +Her unmistakable, unconcealed scorn was like a dagger thrust in the +heart, and that stab of pain stirred his anger and restored him to +himself. His face went almost purple, his cold eyes blazed. "Say," he +cried roughly, "what are you driving at, anyway? Come down to cases +now." He caught her by the wrist. "What did you let me come up here for? +Just to make a monkey of me? Have you been treasuring spite against me +all these months, and is this your way of getting even?" + +She dragged her hand away from him and stepped back. "I let you come, if +you want to know it, because I thought I was in love with you. Lord, +think of it!" she laughed drearily. "I haven't fooled you any worse than +I have myself." + +He rubbed his hand across his eyes. "It ain't true," he said loudly, +positively, defiantly. + +"Hush," she exclaimed, darting forward. "What was that?" There was a +sound as if some one had trod the underbrush not many feet away. She +listened intently a moment, a wild fear at her heart that Seagreave +might have returned unexpectedly. It was probably some animal, for there +was no further sound. "Oh," she cried, in involuntary relief, "it must +have been José!" + +A gleam came into his eyes, a light of triumph as at the remembrance of +some potent weapon of which he had been carelessly forgetful. "And who +is José?" he asked. + +She lifted her startled gaze to his, the question recalled to her her +own unthinking speech. "Oh, one of the miners," she said indifferently. + +He knew her too well to fancy that he could trap her into any new +admissions, and he had no wish to arouse her suspicions. Therefore he +dropped the subject, especially as he felt fully answered. + +He leaned against a tree and, drawing a cigar from his pocket, lighted +it, although the hand with which he did so trembled. "I guess some +explanations are in order between you and me," he said. "I guess it's +about time that you began to get it into your head that you can't make a +fool of me all the time. I'm ready and willing to admit that there was +some excuse for you down in the desert. I made a bad break there, which +I'm freely conceding was no way to treat a lady. But that don't explain +or excuse the way you've treated me this morning," he laughed bitterly. +"There's no way to explain it unless living here in the mountains has +gone to your head or unless there's another man. Is there?" his eyes +pierced her. "Is there?" + +She looked back at him with a hard, inscrutable smile, but she did not +answer. + +Another man! He couldn't, wouldn't believe it. Why, it was only +yesterday that they two had met and loved in the desert. Again he fell +to pleading. "Oh, Pearl, be like what you were again. Don't stand off +from me that way, honey. It ain't in you to be so cruel and hard. Come +back to me, here in my arms. Have your spells; treat me like you please; +but come back to me. Oh, honey, come." + +She looked beyond him, not at him, and then ground a little heap of +freshly fallen pine needles beneath her heel. + +"What's the use?" she said curtly. "It's over. We can quit right here, +Rudolf. I'm done with you, for good." + +His outstretched arms fell by his side, his jaw set. "I guess that's +right," he said viciously. "Any bigger fool than me could see that; and +I'm not going to waste any more time crawling around on my hands and +knees after you; I can tell you that. But you can't fool me on the other +man proposition." + +"I'm not trying to," she interjected cruelly. + +"Who is he?" his voice was ragged and uneven. "Not Flick, I'll bet my +hat. He's been your dog too long for you to fling him anything but a +bone. You'll never tell me, though." + +"Not I," she answered indifferently. + +"Then I'll just satisfy myself--to-night." + +She started and frowned. "You're not staying for that," harshly. "It's +not safe." + +"Oh, yes, I am staying for that, just to satisfy a little curiosity I've +got, and I guess I'll find it safe enough. I guess you've been playing +with kids so far in your career, Miss Pearl Gallito; but you'll find +that the old man's not quite so easy disposed of as you think. I've got +an idea that you'll be down on your knees trying to make terms with him +before we're precisely 'quit' as you've just said." + +"Bah!" she said. "Wind, wind. You can't frighten me with threats. Stay +and watch me dance all you please. That's the only way you'll ever see +me again--from the audience." Without any appearance of haste, she +lifted her scarf from the pine branch on which she had thrown it and +twisted it slowly about her head, then picking up her crimson cape from +the ground, she shook the pine needles from it, wrapped it about her, +and without another word to him, without even a look, took her way down +the trail. + +She did not believe that he meant what he said, she did not believe that +he meant to stay and see her dance that evening. The thought that he +would do so had annoyed her at first, but as she walked downward through +the wine-like amber air, she realized that she did not particularly +care. Her whole being seemed absorbed in the revelation which had come +to her in the first moment of her meeting with Hanson--her love for +Seagreave. In this new, exclusive emotion, the recent interview and all +that had led up to it became to her a mere unpleasant episode, upon +which her indifferent imagination refused to dwell. She wanted to be +alone, that she might fully realize this stupendous change in her +feelings and in her entire outlook upon life. As she thought upon it she +saw that it was no sudden miracle, wrought in the twinkling of an eye, +but an alteration of standards and emotion so gradual that she had not +been aware of it. + +Back in the cabin she luxuriated, exulted in the fact that she would be +alone all day. She piled high the fire with logs, and threw herself in +an easy chair. Thus she could dream undisturbed, could lie watching the +leaping flames and vision for herself again that fair, regular, serene +face, that tall, strong, slender figure. She counted the hours until she +should see him again, until she should dance for him, for it was for +him, him alone, that she would dance. + +Thus she passed the greater part of the day, and even resented the +intrusion upon her thoughts when her father returned a little earlier +than usual from the mine. + +"I got a telegram from Bob to-day," he said. "All that was in it was, +'Coming up to see Pearl dance to-night.'" + +"What!" she cried, showing her dismay. "What is he doing that for?" + +"What he says, I suppose," returned Gallito, "to see you dance." + +She frowned vexedly, but said nothing. + +Her father spoke again. "How are you going down? You will not walk with +Bob and Hugh, Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas?" + +"No," she answered carelessly, although a deeper crimson showed in her +cheek. "Mr. Seagreave said last night that he would take me down in his +cart." + +Gallito nodded, apparently satisfied, and as José came in then to +prepare supper, the matter was dropped. + +As for Pearl, her vexation of the moment was gone; it could have no +place in her mood of exaltation, and when, a few minutes later, she +greeted Bob Flick, he thought that he had never seen her more gay. All +through supper, too, her mood of gayety continued, but immediately after +that meal she drew Flick aside. + +"Bob, I want to tell you something," she said. "No use Hughie, nor Pop, +nor any of the rest of them knowing anything about it," she hesitated a +moment, "but Hanson came up to-day." + +There was no change in his impassive face, only a leap of hard light in +his eyes, and yet she knew that he was on guard in a moment. "Hanson?" + +"Yes, and I saw him for a few moments," she lifted candid eyes to his, +"and, honest, Bob, it's all over. I never expect to see him again, and I +never want to." + +He looked at her, as if trying to read her soul. "Say, Pearl, what is +this," he asked, "straight?" + +"It's what I'm telling you," she looked back at him, nodding +emphatically, and then her face broke into a smile, her sweetest, her +most alluring smile. "Say, Bob, I got to thank you for a good many +things, not to speak of these," she touched the emeralds under her gown; +"but the biggest thing you've ever done for me yet was to keep me from +running away with Hanson." + +Her sincerity was undoubted, and a flush of pleasure rose on his cheek, +and a light came into his eyes which only she could bring there. He +pressed her hands warmly, looking embarrassed and yet delighted. "You +never said anything in all your life, Pearl, that ever pleased me like +that." + +She patted his arm lightly and caressingly, and smiled at him again, +under her lashes. She couldn't help that with any man. "You're awful +good to me, Bob; I guess you're the best and onliest friend I've got." + +"I'm what you want me to be," he spoke a little sadly but very tenderly. +"It'll never make any difference to me what you do or what you don't do; +there'll never be any change in me." + +She let her fingers lie in his clasp, but her glance was absent now, her +thoughts had flown again to Seagreave. "Goodness!" she exclaimed, +rousing suddenly and glancing at the clock, "I've got to make a hustle +for it." + +She was ready half an hour later when Seagreave stopped at the door. +Hugh and Bob Flick had already gone, her father and José had settled +themselves for the evening over the cards, and Pearl stood before the +fire, a long, dark cloak covering her from head to foot and a black +mantilla over her head. José's eyes were full of longing. + +"Oh, that I might go, too," he cried. "The Black Pearl may dance, dance, +after the spirit that is in her; may express her art, but I, although I +grow mad to express mine, must stay mewed up in these mountains with +nothing to do but cook and play cards and talk to a half saint and a +stale, old sinner. If Nitschkan and the petite Thomas had not come, I +should have died. Look at those!" he twinkled his long, delicate fingers +in the air, "there is not such another pair of hands on a combination +lock in all this world." + +Seagreave and Gallito laughed, but paid no further heed to him, and +Harry turned to Pearl with a pretense of disappointment. + +"I thought I should see a butterfly," he said, "a butterfly that had +flown up from the land of eternal summer, and you're only a chrysalis." + +"It's too cold for butterflies up here," she laughed. "Wait until I get +down to the warm hall." But although she returned his banter, she did +not look at him, her eyes were downcast, and on the drive down the hill +she scarcely spoke. Seagreave was one of those rare persons who respect +another's mood of silence, and consequently he did not notice this new +constraint which had overfallen her. + +The hall, lighted with bull's-eye lanterns, was crowded with people, +every one of the chairs taken and every inch of standing room occupied. +There was no platform, but the space upon which Pearl was to dance was +screened off by red curtains. + +But even before she entered the little dressing booth prepared for her, +she hastened to peep through the curtains, scanning the audience with an +eager eye. Her face fell as she saw that Hanson, true to his promise, +was there, and on one of the front seats, not far from Seagreave and Bob +Flick, who were sitting together. His eyes were dull, his face flushed, +and he lurched flaccidly in his chair; he had been drinking heavily all +day. + +He was wondering dully as he sat there if she would enter in the same +indifferent manner that she had adopted the first night he had seen her +down in the desert. Probably she would; it had been very effective. + +But the time for conjecture was over. The curtains were drawn aside, and +Hugh sat down at the piano and began to play a seductive, sensuous +accompaniment. Then through a crimson curtain at the rear Pearl flashed +in as if blown by the mountain wind. The chrysalis had cast aside its +shell and this tropical butterfly had emerged. Her skirts were of yellow +satin, and from a black bodice her beautiful bare shoulders rose half +revealed and half concealed by her rose-wreathed, white _manton de +Manila_. In her black, shining hair, just over one ear, was a bunch of +scarlet, artificial blossoms. + +She floated about the floor for a moment or two like a thistle-down +blown hither and thither by the caprice of the wind, scarcely seeming to +touch the ground, upborne by the music-tide. Throughout her career she +was always at her best when she took those first few moments about the +stage and waited for her inspiration. + +Then she drifted nearer to Hughie and murmured, "The Tango." He changed +his tempo immediately, and almost without a pause of transition she +began that provocative measure--the dance of desire. Thrilling with the +joy of expressing her love, her beautiful new love for Seagreave, +through her art, she danced with a verve, an abandon, a more spontaneous +impulse than she had ever shown before. The Tango! She made it a thing +of alluring advances, of stinging repulses, of sudden, fascinating +withdrawals and exquisite ardors. + +When the applause had finally died down, the hall was still noisy with a +babel of voices; those who could, moved about in the crowded space, and +little groups formed and broke up. Bob Flick, speaking to this or that +acquaintance, felt some one touch him lightly on the arm, and turned +suddenly to see Hanson standing beside him. + +"Hello, Flick," with a sort of swaggering bravado, "our old friend, the +Black Pearl, is going some to-night, ain't she?" + +"I don't know you," drawled Flick, the liquid Southern intonations of +his voice softened until they were almost silky, "and," his hand shot +back to his hip with an almost unbelievable rapidity, "I'll give you +just three minutes to apologize for mentioning Miss Gallito's name, for +speaking to me, and for being here at all." + +Hanson's face had turned a sickly white, more with anger than fear. +"Considering the argument you stand ready to offer," he said, "there's +nothing to do but to apologize my humblest on all three counts. I had +hoped that you'd remember me and be willing to introduce me to your +friend." He turned a cynical and evil glance upon Seagreave, who was +talking to some one a few feet away. "But since you won't, I'll go, just +adding that you and your friend, there, are likely to meet me soon +again." + +There was a touch of scorn in Flick's faint smile. "The three minutes +are up," he said, and without a word Hanson turned and sought his seat. + +The curtains parted now and Hugh again sat down to the piano, but his +music had changed; it was no longer sensuous and provocative, but +strange, and curiously disturbing, with a peculiar, recurring, +monotonous beat. + +It was the voice of the desert full of a savage exultation in its own +loneliness and forsaken isolation, and through it rang a cry of deep, +disdainful triumph, as if it said: "All puny races of men, come to me; +embroider my vast surfaces with the green of your fields and gardens, +build your houses upon my quiescent sand and dream that you have +conquered and tamed me. And I abide, I abide. Silent, brooding, +unwitting of your noisy incursions, I lie absorbed in my dream under my +own illimitable skies. But soon or late, when the moment comes, I wake, +I rouse, I see my inviolate desolations invaded. Then I gather my +strength, I drown you with my torrential rivers, I torture you with my +burning sun, I obliterate you with my flying sand. So shall my cactus +bloom once more, my jeweled lizards crawl unmolested and the cry of the +coyote echo again through the vast, soundless spaces of my desolation. +Then to my looms, to my looms and out of emptiness and silence and +space and light to weave all mysteries of color and all illusions of +beauty." + +"Lord!" cried Bob Flick to Seagreave, "he's playing the desert. I've +seen her look just like the music sounds. That's a sand storm; there's +no other sound in the world like it." He turned his eyes full of a +puzzled wonder on Seagreave. "How can he play all that so that you and I +can see it, when he can't see it himself?" + +"But he does see it," insisted Seagreave; "never think that he doesn't, +and sees it through finer avenues of sight than mere material organs of +vision. He sees the mountains, too. Why, he can play the very shadows on +the snow for me." + +During the Spanish dances Seagreave had not shared the excitement of the +audience, and thus had maintained his usual serenity. He had been +intensely interested and appreciative and admiring; but emotionally +unmoved; but now, as this troubling music of Hughie's seemed to express +the dominion of unsuspected but potent earth-forces, primitive, savage +and forever irreclaimable, his calm became strangely disturbed. Dimly he +realized that should every desert on the globe finally be subdued by the +plow, the irrigating ditches and the pruning hook, they would still +remain as realities in the mind of man, forever clouding his aspirations +toward the mountain peaks and the stars. For the desert must ever remain +an unsolved enigma, never to be reduced to a formula, never to be +explained by any human standards; now whispering to man of the +mysteries of the soul and revealing to him more of the infinite than his +finite senses may grasp; and now mocking him with illusions, her +beautiful mirages wrought of airbeams and sunlight, and transforming him +into a beast of greed with her haunting intimations of hidden and +inexhaustible treasure. + +Thus Hughie's music; and presently Pearl floated out. She had changed +her Spanish costume for the one of scarlet crêpe in which Hanson had +first seen her, a crown of scarlet flowers on her dark hair. Her very +expression, too, had changed, her eyes were elongated, her features +seemed delicately Egyptian; the brooding sphynx look was on her face. + +"She's great, ain't she?" asked Bob Flick. + +Seagreave nodded. He had never seen her superior in technique. It took +character, he appreciated that, to have endured the years of tiresome, +mechanical practice, and to have undertaken it so intelligently that she +had achieved her marvelous results; and she had, beside, youth and +beauty and magnetism. All this alone would have made her a great dancer, +but as he recognized, she had more, much more to bring to her art; a +complex nature which, in its unsounded depths ever held a vision of +beauty, and a sense of this vision which amounted to unity with it, and +therefore gave her the power of expressing it. Her mind, too, was +plastic to all primitive impulses and to Nature; she blended with it. +She was but little influenced by persons, her will was too dominating, +her intelligence too quick, and--but here his analysis ceased. + +The Pearl was dancing to Hugh's strange music, she was dancing the +desert for him--Seagreave. He knew it was for him, although she never +glanced in his direction. And as she danced, he grew to realize that +this feat was not an intellectual one. She was not portraying the spirit +of the desert as gleaned from study and observation and melted in the +crucible of her poetic imagination and molded by her fancy until it was +a thing of form in her thought. The Black Pearl danced the desert +because in her was the power to be one with it and live in its life +through every cell of her being. It was a matter of feeling with her, +one phase of her affinity with the forces of earth; but because she had +the artist's constructive imagination, she could put it into form and +dance it, and by projecting her own feeling into it, convey it to +others. + +The world with its round of outworn, hackneyed appeals, its wearisome +repetitions of crude and commonplace joys, its tawdry and limited +temptations, had long ago fallen away from Seagreave--and left him +nothing, but to-night a voice that he had long ignored, the voice of +life, commanded him. + +"If the desert seems forever to claim her own, what is that to you! Your +work is to reclaim and in the face of a thousand defeats and desolations +still to reclaim, with the eternal faith that for you the wastes shall +blossom like the rose. Work, no matter how brokenly, how futilely. To +build houses of sand is better than to sit in profitless dreams and live +in an animal content." + +When later he drove Pearl up the mountainside, almost in silence, as +they had come, after his few words of admiration and appreciation of her +dancing, there was a shadow for the first time in Harry's clear eyes, a +shadow which did not pass. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Had Gallito but known it, his theory of the unexpected was never more +perfectly demonstrated than it was upon the night Pearl danced and in +the days which followed. Hanson had left early the next morning with the +firm determination of returning almost immediately accompanied by one or +more detectives and of securing that much coveted prize, José. Also, he +gloated over the prospect of seeing Gallito, Bob Flick and Seagreave +arrested for conniving at José's escape and for harboring him during all +these months. + +But the unexpected did occur. As Seagreave had predicted, the snow began +to fall, and began the very night that Pearl danced in the town hall; +and fell so steadily and uninterruptedly that the progress of the train +which bore Hanson down the mountains was considerably impeded. Thus, the +very forces of the air conspired for José, and ably were they seconded +by other invisible and unknown agencies. Even before Hanson had reached +the coast he found himself powerless "in the fell clutch of +circumstance." He had taken cold in the mountains and for several weeks +was too seriously ill even to contemplate with much interest his plan of +revenge. And by the time that he had recovered sufficiently to give +consideration to the matter again, a very little investigation +convinced him of the necessity for patience. So thoroughly had the +season and the elements conspired, that Colina was effectually cut off +from the outer world, a camp beleaguered by snow, and José, for several +months at least, would be the prisoner of the mountains and not of man. + +But Colina was used to this experience. It was one which she had +regularly undergone every winter of her existence. Therefore, her +inhabitants prepared for it and bore it with what equanimity they could +summon. It was but a small camp so far up in the mountains that the +mines were practically only worked during the late spring, the summer +and the early autumn months, for the water which ran the concentrating +and stamp mills was frozen early in the winter and the mines were +practically closed down. One or two, like the Mont d'Or, were kept open, +and worked a few hours a day, but no milling was done and the ore dumps +increased to vast size. + +The railroad, a steep and tortuous way, was not, _per se_ a passenger +line, but existed to carry the ore down to the smelters, therefore, when +there was no ore to carry, it was a matter of indifference to the mine +owners who controlled the line whether trains ran or not; in fact, they +preferred not from a strictly business standpoint, and truly they had an +excellent excuse in the heavy drifts which completely obliterated the +narrow, shining, steel path which led to the world beyond the mountains. + +The police officials whom Hanson consulted as soon as his returning +health permitted him to do so, realized that in spite of their anxiety +to secure the famous and slippery Crop-eared José, he was quite as +safely imprisoned by the mountains as if they themselves had secured +him. There was no possible escape for him. All trails were blocked long +before the railroad was, so there he was, caught as securely as a bird +in a cage, and they, his potential captors, might sit down to a +comfortable period of pleasant anticipation and await that thaw which +was bound to come sooner or later. So much for Gallito's unexpected. + +As for those who would have been interested had they but known--the +little group held in compulsory inaction by those white, encircling +hills--they accepted it as a part of the year's toll, no more to be +murmured at than the changing seasons, and as inevitable as were they. +But it was an experience which Pearl had never known, and Seagreave +looked to see it wear upon her spirit, and daily experienced a new +surprise that there was no evidence of its doing so. Instead, she seemed +to glow hourly with a richer and fuller life, a softer beauty. But +although an intimacy greater than he and she had yet known, would seem +to be enforced by this winter of isolation and leisure, she did not, for +a time, see as much of him as before. A constraint, almost like a blight +upon their friendship, seemed to have fallen between them ever since the +night that she had danced. Seagreave did not come down to Gallito's +cabin quite so frequently in the evenings, and, according to José, spent +much time by his own fireside absorbed in reading and meditation; and +when he did come it was usually late and, instead of talking to Pearl, +he would listen in silence to Hugh's playing or else engage him in +conversation. + +But this attitude on his part failed to cloud Pearl's spirits. She had +seen men taken with this not inexplicable shyness before, and she made +no effort to rouse Harry from his abstraction or to lure him from his +meditations; femininely, intuitively wise, she left that to time. + +But even in her moods of gayety the Black Pearl was never voluble, and +her habit of silence was a factor in maintaining the mystery with which +Seagreave's imagination was now beginning to invest her, and during +those winter evenings when she would often sit absolutely motionless for +an hour at a time, her narrow eyes dreaming on the fire, the sphynx look +on her face, more than once he felt impelled to murmur: + + "'The Sphinx is drowsy, + Her wings are furled: + Her ear is heavy, + She broods on the world. + Who'll tell me my secret, + The ages have kept?-- + I awaited the seer, + While they slumbered and slept.'" + +Thus, more and more, he saw her as the image of beauty and of mystery, +and ever more frequently he pondered on the nature of the message of the +desert. But had he come down to Gallito's cabin earlier in the evening +he would not have found her brooding on the firelight. Usually, she +danced, keeping well in practice. She and Hughie would discuss by the +hour new movements and effects, and not only discuss, but try them, and +she and José, who had a light foot, often gave Gallito the benefit of +seeing them in many of the old Spanish dances. + +But one evening when Seagreave came down, Pearl was not resting after +her exertions, but ran forward to greet him with unwonted vivacity, and +drew him toward a window in a dim corner of the room, out of earshot of +her father and José. + +"Oh!" she cried. "Look, look at what they have sent me from the camp for +dancing for them. I had no idea it would be so much." She took a roll of +bills from her bosom and showed it to him. Her cheek was flushed, her +eyes were like stars. "Why, even here, even up here," she cried, "I can +make money." + +"You look as if you enjoyed making money," he smiled. + +She looked up at him as if surprised, and then laughed. "Of course, of +course I do. Who doesn't?" Her touch on the bills was a caress. She +seemed to find a joy in the very texture of them. He never dreamed for a +moment that she took a delight in those rather crumpled and dirty bills. +He merely took it for granted that she exulted in the visible expression +of appreciation of her art. + +"And what will you do with it?" he asked. + +"I will send it to my bank when I can get any letters through, and then +when this snowball is big enough I will invest it." + +"In mines?" still idly interested and smiling. + +She shook her head. "I leave that to my father, he is a good judge and +he is lucky at it, and my mother is always buying patches of land and +trading them off, usually to good advantage. But my specialty is unset +stones. I have some very good ones, really, I have. Oh," with a little +glance over her shoulder toward her father and José, "I will show them +to you some day when José is not around. If he knew I had them he would +steal them just for the pleasure of keeping himself in practice." + +"How you love beauty," he said. + +"But they are valuable," she said. "Oh, yes, I love them, too. I love to +let them fall through my fingers, to pour them from one hand to another. +Sometimes, when I am all alone here in the cabin, I sit and I open my +little black leather bag and take them out and hold them in the palm of +my hand, and I turn them this way and that way just to catch the light, +and there is nothing so beautiful; in all the world there is nothing so +beautiful as jewels, except," she caught herself quickly, "the desert, +of course." + +He sighed a little and stirred restlessly, the very mention of the +desert made him vaguely uneasy. He had listened to the call of the +mountains and obeyed it, and from that moment the desert, like the +world, had no place in his thoughts; but since the night that Pearl had +danced it had remained in his mind, and had become to him as a far +horizon. The desert has ever been a factor in the consciousness of man, +not to be excluded, and although Seagreave did not realize it, the +moment had come in which he must reckon with it. He felt the fascination +and repulsion of its impenetrable mystery, of its stark and desolate +wastes, whose spell is yet so potent in the imagination of man, that +many have found in its barren horror the very heart of beauty. He +wondered if the uncontaminated winds which blew from out the ages across +the vast, empty spaces murmured a message of greater import than that +whispered to him among the mountain tops, if the wings of light which +beat unceasingly above its shifting sands lifted the soul to some +undreamed of realm of eternal morning. Something that slept deep within +him stirred faintly; the old passion to adventure, to explore rose in +his heart, his restless, reckless heart, which had, so he believed, +found peace. + +The shadow deepened in his eyes, but he suddenly roused from this +momentary abstraction to find that Pearl was still speaking. + +"Yes, I love them because they are so beautiful, but I love them, too, +because they are valuable." + +"Well, there is no question about your making all the money you wish," +he said, a slight weariness in his tone, "thousands and thousands. The +world will fling it at you. It will cover you with jewels." + +She smiled, a faint, secretive smile of triumph. Ah, so he recognized +that. She had made him feel and admit that she was one of the few great +dancers. + +Then, she, too, sighed. "If only," she said, forgetful of him and +following out her train of thought aloud, "if only when I get what I +want, I wouldn't always want something else! Did you ever feel if you +could just be free, really free, you wouldn't want anything else in the +world?" + +"How could any one be more free than you are?" he laughed down at her. + +"I know, I know," she agreed, still speaking wistfully, "but I'd like to +be free of myself; myself is so strange, and there's so many of me." +Then the veil of her instinctive reticence fell over her again and she +began to talk of her recent attempts to get about on snow-shoes, José +and Hugh having been her instructors, so far. Harry immediately offered +his services, and she accepted them, agreeing to go out with him the +next morning. + +And as they talked José glanced at them from time to time, a touch of +malicious laughter in his odd glancing eyes; there were few things that +escaped José. + +That evening, after Seagreave had gone home, when José and Gallito and +Mrs. Thomas and Mrs. Nitschkan had sat late over their cards, Gallito +had risen after a final game, mended the fire, poured himself a glass of +cognac, lighted another cigarette and, stretching himself in an +easy-chair, entered into one of those confidential talks which he +occasionally permitted himself with his chosen cronies. The earlier part +of the evening José and Pearl had danced for a time together, and then +Pearl had danced for a time alone and in a manner to please even her +father's critical taste. Now, in commenting on this, he remarked: + +"You see the change in my daughter. She is now cheerful, obedient and +industrious. When she came she was none of those things. She is, you +see, a good girl at heart, but her mother had almost ruined her. If men +but had the time they should always bring up the children of the family. +It is only in that way that they can ever be a credit to one." + +Mrs. Thomas, who had been bending over the stove brewing a pot of coffee +which she and Mrs. Nitschkan drank at all hours of the day and night, +raised herself at the utterance of these revolutionary sentiments and +looked at Gallito in grieved and bewildered surprise; but Mrs. +Nitschkan, who had been pouring cream into the cup of steaming coffee +which José had just handed to her, first took a long draught and then +remarked with cool impartiality: + +"The trouble with you, Gallito, is that you can't bear for nobody, man, +woman, child or devil, to get ahead of you. I guess I know somep'n' +about the bringin' up of young ones myself." + +Here Mrs. Thomas sighed and shook her head with that exasperated +incomprehension which all women displayed when the subject of Mrs. +Nitschkan's children came up for discussion. Educators discourse much +upon the proper environment and training of the young of the human +species, but theories aside, practical results seem rather in favor of +casting the bantling on the rocks. For, in spite of Mrs. Nitschkan's +joyous lack of responsibility, her daughters had grown up the antitheses +of herself, thoroughly feminine little creatures, already famous for +those womanly accomplishments for which their mother had ever shown a +marked distaste, while the sons were steady, hard-working, reputable +young fellows, always to be depended upon by their employers. + +"It's nothing but your pizen luck, Sadie," murmured Mrs. Thomas. + +"We must allow that Providence has been kinder to you than most," +remarked Gallito sardonically. + +"It's a reward," said Mrs. Nitschkan with calm assurance, refilling her +pipe with more care than she had ever bestowed upon her children. "It's +'cause I ain't ever shirked an' left the Lord to do all my work for me." + +At this Mrs. Thomas, too overcome to speak, tottered feebly back from +the stove and fell weakly into a chair. + +"No, sir," continued the gypsy with arrogant virtue, "the trouble with +all the parents I know, includin' present company, is that they're too +easy. I don't work no claim expectin' to get nothin' out of it, do I? +And I don't bring a lot of kids into the world and spend years teachin' +'em manners--" + +She was interrupted here by a brief and scornful laugh from Mrs. Thomas, +who, on observing that her friend was gazing at her earnestly and +ominously, hastily converted it into a fit of coughing. + +"Spend years teachin' 'em manners an' sacrifice myself to stay at home +and punish 'em when I might be jantin' 'round myself, not to have 'em +turn out a credit to me." + +There was a finality about the statements which seemed to admit of no +further discussion, but after José had escorted the two women to their +cabin, he had returned for one of those midnight conferences with +Gallito over which they loved to linger, and the Spaniard had again +expressed his satisfaction in Pearl's changed demeanor. + +José's laughter pealed to the roof. "You have eyes but for mines and +cards, Gallito. Though the world changes under your nose, you do not see +it. The moles of the earth--they are funny!" + +"Bah!" casting at him a scornful glance from under his beetling brows, +"your eyes see so far, José, that you see all manner of things which do +not exist." + +"I have far sight and near sight and the sight which comes to the +seventh child," returned José with pride. "Therefore, seeing what I see, +I say my prayers each day, now." + +A bleak smile wrinkled Gallito's parchment-like cheeks. "And to whom do +you pray, José, your patron saint, or rather sinner, the Devil?" + +José looked shocked. "You are a blasphemer, Gallito," he reproved, and +then added piously, "I say my prayers each day that I may, by example, +help Saint Harry." + +"And why is Harry in need of your example?" said Gallito, holding up his +glass between himself and the fire and watching the deep reflections of +ruby light in the amber liquid. + +"It goes against me to see an unequal struggle," sighed José. "He is +hanging on desperately to his ice-peak, but the Devil has almost +succeeded in clawing him off." + +Gallito frowned. "This talk of yours is nonsense, José; but if there is +anything in it, Harry may understand that any interest he may have in my +daughter can lead to nothing. She is a dancer before she is anything +else, it is in her blood. Harry does not and never can understand her; +only one of her own kind can do that. He is by nature a religious; his +cabin is the cell of a monk." + +Again José's eerie, malicious laughter echoed through the room. + +"Aye, laugh," growled Gallito; "but you see my daughter for the first +time. You think because she smiles at Harry that she loves him; you +think because she is the only woman he talks to that he loves her; you +do not know her. She is young, she is beautiful and a dancer. She has +had many lovers ever since she put her hair up, and learned how she +could make a fool of a man with her eyes and her smile, and she has made +them pay toll. She always did that from the first." There was a note of +fierce pride in his harsh, brief laughter. "Yes, she would smile and +promise anything with her eyes, but she gave nothing. It is +strange"--the old Spaniard, his austere spirit mellowed by his excellent +cognac, fell into a mood of confidential musing, an indulgence which he +rarely permitted himself--"that Hugh, the child of a woman I never saw, +reaches my heart more than my own daughter does. But Pearl is a study to +me. I say to myself, 'She cares for nothing but money, applause, +admiration,' and yet, even while I say it, I am not sure; I do not know, +I do not know." + +Again he admired the glints of firelight reflected in his cognac glass. +"But this I do know, José, she is an actress before she is anything +else." + +José leered knowingly. "You think only of your daughter," he said. "What +about Saint Harry? He has mad blood in him, too. It is only a few years +that he has been a saint; before that the Devil held full sway over him. +And," he added pensively, after a moment's cogitation, "there are many +lessons one learns from the Devil." + +"You should know," returned Gallito, with his twisting, sardonic smile. + +"Ah, the Devil is not all bad," said José defensively. "One can learn +from him the lesson of perseverance, and perseverance is a virtue." + +Gallito waved his hand with a polite gesture. "You know more of him and +his lessons than I, José. I am always ready to grant that." He took +another sip of cognac, blew a succession of smoke wreaths toward the +ceiling, and again resumed his midnight philosophizings. "What puzzles +me, José, is what is going to become of us in Heaven. We shall never be +content. Content is a lesson that no one has ever learned. Look at Saint +Harry. He has Heaven right here. His time to himself, enough to live on +without working, no women to bother him, your cooking; and it may be on +that that you will win an entrance to Heaven; it will certainly be on +nothing else. But, if, as you say, he is interested in my daughter, he +is throwing away all chance of keeping Paradise." + +"Do we not all do that?" said José dismally. "It is because a man cannot +conceive of a Heaven without a woman in it. He thinks in spite of all +experience to the contrary that she is what makes it Heaven." + +"Yes, experience counts for nothing," Gallito sighed for himself and his +brothers. + +But if Seagreave sat silent and absorbed when he came to Gallito's cabin +in the evening, it did not bother Pearl. She was an expert in such +symptoms. Sometimes he talked to her in a rather constrained fashion, +but for the most part he sat on the other side of the room, listening to +Hugh's music. + +One evening when he sat listening he suddenly lifted his eyes and gazed +at the Pearl, who sat almost the length of the room away from him. The +cabin was lighted only by the great log fire, and the leaping, ardent +flames of the pine, mingled with the soft, glowing radiance of burning +birch, invested the room and its occupants with that atmosphere of +mystery and glamour, essential in flame-illumined shadow. And Hugh was +playing the music the masters dreamed in the twilight hours when silence +and shadow permitted them, even wooed them to a more intimate revelation +of the heart than the definite splendors of daylight inspired. + +Beyond the zone of the firelight, the room was all in a warm gloom, rich +and dim. Pearl and Hugh had gathered fir branches, even some young +trees, and had placed them about the walls, and in the warmth their +aromatic, delicious odor permeated and pervaded the cabin, and one +discerning those half-defined branches might easily imagine that the +walls stretched away into the dim forest. + +Pearl lay back in an easy chair, her narrow, half-closed eyes on the +leaping flames. The wind, low to-night, the wind of eternity which blows +ever in the mountains, sang about the cabin and blended with Hugh's +music like a faint violin obligato. But even in this soft twilight of +blending and mingling and harmonizing, with pine branches above and +beyond her and shadowed gloom about her, Pearl never for a moment seemed +the spirit of the forest. + +With its dim depths for a background, she shone on it, as brilliant and +distinct from it as a flashing jewel on the breast of a nun. Her crimson +frock caught a deeper warmth from the firelight, her black hair shone +like a bird's wing, the jewels on her fingers sent out sparkles of light +and flame. As Saint Harry continued to gaze at her the forest with all +its haunting, dreaming witchery vanished, the high invitation of the +mountains, "Come ye apart," ceased to echo in his ears. The world +environed, encompassed her; he seemed to discern the yearning of her +spirit for it, the airy rush of her winged feet toward it; and yet her +eyes, those eyes which sometimes held the look of having gazed for ages +on time's mutations, were turned toward the desert. Then Seagreave's +moment of vision passed and he turned to Hugh with an odd sinking of the +heart. + +Hugh had ceased to play and sat silent now on his piano stool with that +motionless, concentrated air of his, as if listening to something afar. + +"Hughie," said Seagreave softly, "what _are_ you and your sister, +anyway?" + +Hugh laughed and, leaning his elbow on the keys, rested his cheek on +his palm. "I am a little brother of the wind," he said. "I was just +listening to it singing to me out there; and Pearl, well, Pearl is a +daughter of fire." + +"What is it that you hear that I don't?" asked Harry. "I listen to the +wind, too, sometimes for hours, up there in my cabin; but it's only a +falling, sighing thing to me, sometimes a rising, shrieking one. What is +this gift of music?" + +"I don't know," said Hugh simply, "but if you will wait a moment, I will +play you the song the wind is singing through the pines to-night. It is +just a little, sad one." + +Again he sat immobile, listening for a while and then began to play so +plaintive and wistful a melody that Harry felt the old sorrow wake and +stir within his heart and demand a reckoning of the forgetful years. Not +realizing that he did so, he arose and began to pace up and down the +room, nor remembered where he was until he looked up to see Pearl +watching him, surprise and even a slight curiosity upon her face. + +"Forgive me," he said, stopping before her, "for walking up and down +that way as if I were in my own cabin, but something in Hugh's music set +me to dreaming." + +"You didn't look as if they were happy dreams," she said. + +"Didn't I?" he spoke as lightly as he could; then he changed the +subject. "Do you know that the crust on the snow is thicker than it has +been yet? How would you like to go out on your snow-shoes to-morrow +morning?" + +She looked her pleasure. "That will be fine," she cried eagerly. + +She was up betimes the next day, anxious to see whether more snow had +fallen during the night; but none had. To her joy, it was one of those +brilliant mornings when the sky seems a dome of sapphire sparkles, and +the crust of the snow with the sun on it is like white star-dust +overlaid with gold. The radiance would have been unbearable had not the +bare, black trees veiled the sky with their network of branches and +twigs and the pines softened the snow with their shadows. + +Pearl had rapidly acquired proficiency in her new accomplishment, and +she and Seagreave had covered several miles when, on their return, they +paused to rest a bit in the little bower of stunted pines. Here +Seagreave cut some branches from the trees for them to sit on and, +gathering some dry, fallen boughs and cones, built a fire. + +They enjoyed this a few moments in silence and then Pearl spoke. "Why," +she asked with her usual directness, "why did you get up and walk up and +down the room last night when Hughie was playing? What was it in his +music that made you forget all of us and even, as you said, forget that +you were not in your own cabin?" + +"That was stupid of me and rude, too," he said compunctiously. +"Something that he was playing called up so vivid a memory that I forgot +everything." + +There was a quick gleam in her eyes; she was resentful of memories that +could make him forget her very presence, hers. "What was it you were +thinking of?" she asked. Her voice was low. + +He looked out over the snow before he answered. "A girl," he said, and +cast another handful of pine cones upon the fire. + +She did not speak nor move, and yet her whole being was instinct with a +sudden tense attention. "Yes, a girl," she said insistently. "What was +she like?" the words leaped from her, voicing themselves almost without +her volition. + +He sighed and appeared to speak with some effort. "It was long ago," he +said. "She was like violets or white English roses." + +"And did you love her?" she asked, that soft tenseness still in her +voice, "and did she love you?" + +"I suppose every man has his ideal of woman, perhaps unconsciously to +himself, and she was mine." + +He sighed again and she glanced quickly at him from the corners of her +eyes with a half scornful smile upon her lips. She knew that she did not +suggest violets, shy and fragrant and hidden under their own green +leaves; neither was there anything in the mountains to suggest the +gardens in which roses grew. But he had left the violets and English +roses long ago, because of that spirit of restlessness within him, and +finally he had come to these wild, savage mountains and was content +here, where it was difficult even to picture the calm and repose of the +gardens he had left. He had said that he did not know why he had come, +but Pearl did. She never doubted it. It was the call of her heart across +the world to him, seeking him, reaching him, drawing him to her. + +"And does it make you unhappy to think of her now?" she asked still +softly. + +"No," he said, "no, not now. But last night something in the music +caused the years to drop away and I was back there again and she rose +before me. Really, I felt her very presence. I saw her as plainly as I +see you now." + +Pearl rose and shook the snow from her cloak. "Forget it," she said +scornfully. The little horse-shoe frown showed between her brows, and +her eyes as she looked at him were full of a sparkling disdain. "That +girl wasn't worth that," she snapped her fingers. "And here you've been +loping over the globe for years, because she turned you down. I should +think you'd feel like a fool." She spoke quite fearlessly, although +Seagreave had thrown up his head and stood looking at her with a white +face and compressed lips. "But that ain't the reason," she went on +shrewdly. "I know men. You like to think you quit things because of the +girl," she laughed that low, harsh, unpleasant laugh of hers. "You quit +'em because you got lazy, and anything like a responsibility was a bore. +That's straight." + +Without another glance at him, she sped down the hill, like an arrow +shot from a bow. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +As that long, white winter slowly wore away there were many in the camp +who, although they had endured the strain of a wearing monotony through +many previous seasons, nevertheless suffered greatly from it; and, in +consequence, as the clock of the year began to indicate spring an almost +riotous joy was felt and expressed when it was announced through the +camp that the Black Pearl had again consented to dance for them. + +It was considered a truly fitting celebration of the fact that there had +already been one great thaw, and, although there was every possibility +of things freezing up again, yet nevertheless spring had at last loosed +her hounds and they were hard on winter's traces. In fact, one belated +train, after hours spent on the road, had succeeded in pushing through, +an evidence that they all would soon be running with their accustomed, +if rather erratic regularity, and there was naturally a tremendous +excitement and jollification in the camp at this arrival of the first +mail bearing news from the outside world. + +The messages for Pearl included a letter from her mother and one from +Bob Flick, but none from Hanson. Bob Flick announced that his patience +was worn thin and that he would be up on the first train bearing +passengers. Mrs. Gallito's letter was full of commiserations for her +daughter on her enforced detention, and she evidently regarded the +nature of that durance as particularly vile. + +"Pearl, how you been standing it up in that God-forsaken hole where you +can't even keep warm is what beats me. Seems to me I went to church +once, oh, just for a lark, and the preacher talked about some plagues of +Egypt, all different kinds, you know. It was real interesting. I always +remembered it. But in looking back over plagues I've seen, the very +worst of all was snow. I'm afraid, when I see you again, you'll be all +skin and bone and shadow. I do hope you won't be sick like poor Hanson. +I had an awful sad letter from him; seems he took cold and's been at +death's door." + +Pearl rustled the paper impatiently. She was not interested in this +news. Hanson occupied her thoughts so little that she did not even pause +to wonder how he was. The very sight of his name in the letter stirred a +vague irritation in her. Absorbed in her love for Seagreave, Hanson had +become to her as a forgotten episode. + +However, her mother dropped the subject and took up the more interesting +one of Lolita. "That bird certainly has mourned for you, Pearl. I guess +she'd have just about pined away if it hadn't been for Bob Flick." + +But Pearl was not the only recipient of letters from the outside world; +all of the little group, with the exception of José, had received their +quota, even Mrs. Nitschkan. But the bulk of the mail, which Gallito +brought up from the village postoffice and gravely distributed, fell to +Mrs. Thomas. Almost without exception, these envelopes were addressed in +straggling, masculine characters which suggested painful effort and +seemed to indicate that the writers were more used to the pick and +shovel than to the pen. But although Mrs. Thomas had to spell out the +contents of each missive with more or less difficulty, her giggles, +blushes and occasional exclamations showed how much pleasure they +afforded her. + +Mrs. Nitschkan, however, after glancing carelessly at the large, yellow +envelope which was addressed to her in a clerkly hand, cast it +carelessly aside and went on assiduously cleaning and oiling her gun. +But the sight of it aroused Mrs. Thomas's curiosity, and after glancing +at it once or twice over the top of her own letters, she could not +forbear to ask: + +"Ain't you going to read your letter, Sadie?" + +"Mebbe. Sometime. By an' by. When I get good an' ready," returned the +gypsy indifferently and abstractedly, squinting with one eye down the +barrel of her gun. "What do I want with letters? I got two bear an' a +mountain lion before the snow flew." + +Mrs. Thomas laid aside her letters for the moment, and, lifting a large +pot of coffee from the stove, poured out a cupful for her friend and +then one for herself. "Here, Sadie," she coaxed, "rest yourself with a +cup of coffee. I'll set down the sugar and cream an' whilst you're +drinking it, open your letter. Come now, do. Maybe it's from a +gentleman." + +"It sure is," replied Mrs. Nitschkan, laying her gun carefully across +her knee, wiping her hands on the cloth with which she had been +polishing it, and then dropping several lumps of sugar into the cup, she +poured herself a liberal allowance of cream. "It's a bill for that +double-j'inted, patent, electrical fishin' rod that I sent East for, +clean to New York City, for a weddin' present for Celia." + +Mrs. Thomas gave a faint, scornful laugh at the thought of this most +incongruous gift for Mrs. Nitschkan's pretty, feminine daughter. "A +fishin' rod for Celia!" she exclaimed, "when all she ever thinks about +is cookin' an' sweepin' an' sewin' all day." + +"That's it," Mrs. Nitschkan radiated self-approbation and satisfaction. +"It made a nice show at the weddin', didn't it? And it has sure been +useful to me since." + +But Mrs. Thomas had again absorbed herself in her correspondence, and it +is doubtful if she heard these last words. "Say, Sadie," she cried +presently, a ripple of joyous excitement in her voice, "listen here to +what Willie Barker says, 'If you don't come back soon, I'm a-going to +lay right down an' die, or maybe take my own life.'" + +"Then you'll stay right on here," said Mrs. Nitschkan shortly but +emphatically. "Such a chanst as that's not to be missed." + +Mrs. Thomas pouted, "But, honest, can't we pretty soon leave these old +prospects that you're a-nursin' along to salt an' get ready to palm off +on some poor Easterner?" + +The gypsy took a long draught of coffee, wiping her mouth on the back +of her hand. "Your ungratefulness'll strike in and probably kill you, +Marthy Thomas. Here I burdened myself with you to save your life +insurance and the nice little property Seth left you from a pack of +wolves in the camp that's after them, an' not you, an' what thanks do I +get? All these months I been workin' like the devil to convert you an' +José, an' as far as either of you's concerned, I might a darned sight +better have put in my time tryin' to save the soul of a flea. You +couldn't even let a poor, God-forsaken robber like José alone. Don't you +know that if you get a thousand husbands they'll all treat you as bad or +worse'n Seth did?" + +"He's an angel in heaven right now an' don't you dare say a word against +him, Sadie Nitschkan," cried Mrs. Thomas defensively, "but he was a +devil all the same." + +"They'll all be devils," returned Mrs. Nitschkan fatalistically. "They's +no man can stand seein' a feather pillow around all the time an' not +biff it, especially when it can turn on a gallon of tears any time of +the day or night." + +Mrs. Thomas made no effort to refute this last aspersion. Instead, she +began to weep loudly and unrestrainedly. "Bob Martin says in his letter +that he hopes I'm havin' a pleasant time," she sobbed. "He don't know +the loneliness, not to say the danger, of being snowed up in these +mountains with a woman that ain't got no more feelin' than to skin you +alive whenever she's a mind to. I ain't afraid of gentlemen, even +husbands, but sometimes when you get to jawin' me, Sadie, with a gun in +your hand, it makes my poor heart go like that, an' I crawl all over +with goose-flesh." + +Fortunately, the thaws continued, and if no great quantity of snow fell +between now and then, the first passenger train was scheduled to run +through on the day that Pearl would dance, but Bob Flick, by some method +known to himself, had succeeded in making his journey on the engine, and +thus arrived at Gallito's cabin several days before he was expected, +looking a little more worn than usual and faintly anxious, an expression +which speedily disappeared as he saw the radiant health and spirits of +Pearl. As for her, she was unfeignedly glad to see him. + +"I sure have worried a lot about you this winter, Pearl," he said to her +that evening as they two sat a little apart from the rest, Gallito, +José, Hugh and Seagreave, who all clustered about the fire, while Pearl, +as usual, had drawn her chair within the warm gloom of the pine-scented +shadow. + +"Ain't you silly!" She looked up at him with her heart-shattering, +adorable smile. + +"I am always about you," he said. "You're all I think of, Pearl, night +and day." + +She patted his arm lightly. "I've always got you to depend on anyway, +haven't I, Bob?" Her soft, lazy, sliding voice was itself a caress. + +"You sure have. Anytime, anywhere. No matter what happens, I can't ever +change, Pearl. Lord! You ought to know that by this time." + +"Maybe I do, Bob, and maybe I like knowing it." + +"I hope you do, but it wouldn't make any difference whether you did or +didn't. I got to love you. I guess the cards fell that way for me before +I was born and nothing can ever change that layout." + +"You've never failed me yet, Bob." + +"And never will. Oh, Pearl, don't you, can't you see your way to +marrying me?" + +She stirred restlessly, a faintly troubled look shadowing her face. +"There's so many of me, and I never know what I'm going to do or how I'm +going to feel. I'd just be bound to make you miserable." + +"It wouldn't be the first time," he said a little sadly. "But you see I +know you. I ain't got any mistaken notions about you, and I love you +more than any other man in this life'll ever do, Pearl." + +Again she moved and looked at him as if his words had roused in her some +regret. "I guess that's so; but--it wouldn't be a square deal." + +"I'll tend to that," he urged, "and you'll just have to know that I'm +always loving you, no matter what's to pay." + +"I--" she began, but was interrupted by José, who bowed low before her. + +"Señorita," grandiosely, "the ladies and your father beg that, unworthy +as I am to dance on the same floor as you, that yet, as a compliment to +Mr. Flick, we go through some of the Spanish dances together." + +Pearl assented and half rose, but Flick laid a detaining hand on her +sleeve. "She will in a minute," he said. "Run along now, José, me and +Miss Gallito's got something to talk over." He bent close to her again. +"Pearl," there was the faintest shake in his voice, "what are you going +to tell me, now?" + +"Oh, Bob," the regret was in her voice now, "I wish, I wish you didn't +feel that way. I love you more than 'most anybody in the world--but not +that way. And--and I don't want to lose your love for me. I like to know +it's there. I sort of lean up against it." + +He waited a moment or two before answering her, and then his voice was +as steady as ever. "You can always come back to my love for you. The +stars can fall out of the sky and the mountains slide down, but my love +for you can't change, Pearl. It's fixed and steady and forever." + +"Dear old Bob," she touched his cheek as she passed him with a light +caress and went on into the room beyond to get her dancing slippers. + +It was later that evening that José began his unceasing importunities to +see Pearl dance in the town hall. A stern and surprised veto of this +plan was his immediate answer. But José was the most convincing and +plausible of pleaders. + +"But, Gallito," he cried almost piteously, "since Mrs. Nitschkan has +watched my manners I have been like an angel. No more does the camp say +that this hill is haunted, you know that." + +"I told you what you'd get if you didn't stop hootin' at people who was +passin'," remarked Mrs. Nitschkan, knocking the ashes from her pipe out +on the hearth and then carefully refilling it. "But you're none so good +now that you need brag. I don't know that playin' monkey tricks to +frighten folks ain't just as good a way to put in the time as sittin' +'round holdin' hands with Marthy Thomas." + +"Sadie!" Mrs. Thomas drew forth her handkerchief and prepared to shed +the ready tear. "How you can have the heart to talk so to a woman that +ain't buried her husband twelve months! Mr. José ain't even thought of +takin' the liberties you sit there accusin' him of. If I had a live +husband to pertect me, you wouldn't dare treat me like what you do. +Whenever you miss a shot, or get fooled on a prospect, or get some money +won away from you, you come back to our little cabin an' sit lookin' at +me like you was a wolf an' talkin' like you was a she-bear. And--and +it's darned hard, that's what it is." + +"If you were a man, Nitschkan," José drew himself up truculently, "you +would indeed answer for such speeches, and you would not have converted +me so easily, either. I have no fear of men." This was quite true, he +had not, but his eye quailed and drooped before the steady gaze of Mrs. +Nitschkan. + +"Come, come," said Gallito peremptorily, "I am glad to see you all each +evening about my fireside, but I will have no arguing nor quarreling, +understand that. A man's house is his castle." + +José diplomatically dropped the subject, which did not mean that he had +abandoned his plan for one moment. He merely waited a more convenient +season. His strongest arguments were that it was not an infrequent +occurrence for Gallito to entertain guests of his own nationality in his +mountain cabin. "And my hair!" cried José pathetically. "It would be a +crown of glory to Nitschkan if she had it; but it is a shame to me, a +man, to have to wear it so long. No one in the camp could possibly know +that I have ears." + +Gallito at first absolutely refused to listen to him, but so adroitly +did José bring up the subject every evening that he began to make some +impression on his stern jailer. He was careful, though, not to mention +his hopes until near midnight, when Gallito's normally harsh mood was +greatly softened not only by winning the final game, which José +invariably permitted now, but also by the mellowing influence of his +bland, old cognac. Then Gallito would embark on an argument, determined +to convince José of the wild folly of his desire. + +Their debate continued for several evenings and finally ended, as José +meant it should, in Gallito giving a reluctant consent, under certain +conditions which he insisted should be rigidly carried out. + +He admitted that it was unlikely that any suspicion would be aroused in +the village. Those who saw the party enter the hall would, if they +thought about the matter at all, take it for granted that the stranger +was some friend of Bob Flick's who had come up with him on the train. +But two conditions Gallito insisted upon: the first, that José was to +turn the collar of his heavy overcoat high up about his face and draw +his hat low over his brows, and the second was that he was only to be +permitted to observe the dancing from behind the curtain of the little +recess at the end of the hall which served Pearl as a dressing room. He +might gaze his fill through the peep-hole there, but under no +circumstances was he to be seen in the body of the hall. But these +conditions, as Gallito pointed out, were entirely dependent on Pearl. It +was a question whether she would tolerate José for a whole evening in +her dressing room. + +At first she flatly refused to do so and turned a persistently deaf ear +to José's pleading. She had to slip out of one frock and into another at +least three times. There would not be room with José sitting there. + +"But, dear Señorita, I will not be sitting there," he cried. "When the +moment comes that you change your frock I will be standing with my face +to the wall and my eyes covered with my hands." + +"I should hope so," murmured Mrs. Thomas, who was present. + +But Pearl had another reason for not wishing to be alone with José upon +this occasion. She meant to wear her emeralds, and she was not so +anxious that the light-fingered bandit should have so near a view of +them. When she mentioned this to Bob Flick and her father, however, they +laughed at her fears. Not that they trusted José, but, as they pointed +out, no matter how much he might be tempted by the jewels, there was no +possible way for him to escape with them. He was clever enough to +realize this, therefore his resistance to temptation under trying +circumstances might be taken for granted. So Pearl at last gave her +reluctant consent. + +Upon the afternoon of the day that Pearl was to dance Hughie brought the +news that the first train bearing passengers had arrived, hours late, +nearer six o'clock in the evening, than twelve, noon, when it was due; +but nevertheless it had made the journey. It brought several people, but +no one seemed to know who they were. + +"It is a question," said Gallito, squinting his eyes at the sky, +"whether they will get back as easily as they came. See, the snow is +again beginning to fall." + +It was still snowing as the entire party, men and women, drove down the +hill to the town hall. As there was not room for all in the mountain +wagon, Seagreave again drove Pearl down in his cart. + +They arrived early, as Gallito meant they should, and to his +satisfaction found almost nobody in the hall, which was yet but dimly +lighted. + +Pearl immediately vanished into her dressing room, with José carrying +the case containing her make-up, changes of costume, slippers, etc., +close behind her. + +Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas, Flick, Gallito and Seagreave selected +their seats in the front row and, sitting down, began a discussion of +certain mining matters while the house gradually filled. This took but a +few moments. The inhabitants of Colina were too keen for a little +diversion after the winter famine of amusement to stand upon the order +of their coming. They came at once, and almost in a body. + +Pearl was equally prompt, ready to begin upon the stroke of the hour, +and as the time approached Hughie could be heard running his fingers +over the keys, although the curtains had not yet been drawn back. By +this time there was no longer standing room in the hall. + +Mrs. Nitschkan was still deep in a mining discussion. "Who should I run +across yesterday," she was saying, "but the Thompson boys. They just +took a lease on the 'Pennyroyal,' you know, and they wanted me to go up +and look it over. Well, I know, and you know, Gallito, the history of +that mine from 'way back. 'She's got a bad name, boys,' I says, 'a bad +name.' Well, I went through some of the new drifts with 'em, and I +chipped off some specimens." She pulled two or three of these from her +coat pocket and passed them over to the men. "They sure look mighty good +to me," she chuckled. "The truth of the matter is that that mine ain't +never been worked right. We can knock it so skilful, though, Gallito, +that the boys'll be glad to let us have it for 'most nothing. Jus' look +'round the hall, Bob, an' see if you can see 'em here to-night." + +To oblige her he turned in his leisurely fashion and began to scan the +audience. + +Flick had never been known to start; that was a part of his training. If +a cannon had been fired off close to his ear, the narrowest observer +could not have discerned the twitch of a muscle; neither would he have +exhibited the faintest change of expression; training again. Now, his +face was quite as impassive as usual. His mild, indifferent glance +continued to rove over the house, noting with the accuracy of an adding +machine certain men who either stood or sat in different parts of the +house. Presently he encountered the gaze of Hanson, who was sitting +almost directly opposite to him and who was evidently trying to attract +his attention. + +Eye held eye. On Hanson's face was unconcealed triumph, a cynical +exultation. He nodded with smiling insolence, but Flick regarded him +with a blank stare of non-recognition for a moment or so and then turned +indifferently away. It was a matter of considerable surprise to those +who bent watchful eyes on him from various parts of the hall that he did +not, as far as they could see, speak either to Gallito or Seagreave. + +In any event, he would have had but little time for consultation with +them, for almost immediately the curtains were drawn aside, Hugh began +to play, and Pearl made her appearance. That was the signal for applause +as prolonged as it was enthusiastic. She was like a vision of the spring +so eagerly awaited by these prisoners of winter. Her frock, which fell +to her ankles, was of some white, silky, soft material and was deeply +bordered with silver; her sleeves were of silver and there was a touch +of silver on the bodice. Her emeralds gleamed like green fire against +her bare white throat and as she danced a froth of rose-colored +petticoat was visible, foaming above her ankles. + +To all those eager, watching people Pearl seemed truly the incarnation +of May in all its glory and shimmer, and Hughie's music was like the +silver, fluting notes of her insistent heralds proclaiming the south +wind, and bird calls and murmuring rivulets of melting snow. And when +she ceased and they finally permitted her to withdraw before dancing +again it was almost with a shock that they realized that the snow was +still falling outside. + +It was then that Bob Flick turned at last to his two companions. "You've +seen?" was his brief, low-voiced comment. Both men nodded. + +"Every deputy in the county here," said Seagreave in as low a voice as +the one Flick had used. "No exits for us anywhere. The sheriff has them +well stationed." + +"Thank God, I came," muttered Gallito, "but I wish we knew their plan." + +"That's easy," said Flick. "Hanson's so sure that he's won the game +before it's played that he's ready to tell any one that will listen to +him how it all happened, before it's begun. I guess I'll go over and +talk to him a little before Pearl comes on again." + +He rose to his tall, languid height and sauntered in his laziest fashion +across the floor. + +"Say, stranger," he began, resting his elbow on the back of a chair next +Hanson, and leaning his head on his hand, "haven't we met before. It +seemed to me a few moments ago when I caught your eye that your face was +more or less familiar." + +"Well, now ain't that strange!" exclaimed Hanson in affected surprise. +"But I just had a sort of an idea that you'd recognize me to-night in +spite of my disguise. Yes, now you ask me, let me tell you, since your +memory is so poor, that we have met once or twice before, but it ain't +likely that we ever will again. Sad," he shook his head and sighed +heavily, "I hate to disappoint you by telling you so, but, someway, I +got that idea firmly fixed in my head." + +"Is that so?" said Flick politely. "Well, maybe you're right. It does +kind of look so from the layout you've got here. How are you going to +play it, anyway? Both ends to the middle, I suppose." + +"Correct," returned Hanson blithely. "We lined up outside to watch you +when you got out of the wagon. If you hadn't brought him with you we +wouldn't have disturbed you during the entertainment; just gone up the +hill and got him and then rounded the rest of you up afterward. But you +were kind enough to save us that trouble." + +"Don't mention it," drawled Flick; "but I don't just sabe why you didn't +take us when we drove up. You had the whole bunch of us then." + +"We're taking no chances," Hanson winked knowingly. "The boys up here +have been having a pretty long, dull winter, and such a move on our part +might have given them the idea that we were trying to break up their fun +this evening, which they wouldn't have stood for. Then, old Gallito's +popular here, God knows why, and if he'd asked the boys to stand by him +and they saw a chance of some excitement, why, we'd have had an +unnecessary mix-up. See? Not but what we'd have been a good deal more +than equal to any scrap they could have put up even if led by you and +old Gallito, but the sheriff didn't want any trouble of that kind when +it was so easy to avoid it." + +"Good sense," commended Flick, "but are you so sure you've entirely +side-stepped that danger? There's after-the-ball-is-over still to be +considered." + +"Trust old uncle wiseacre over there for that," said Hanson +vaingloriously, and nodding as he spoke toward the sheriff, who leaned +big and calm and watchful against the door at the back of the room. +"He's a born general. The plan, son, can't be beat. They know he's in +the Pearl's dressing room and they got the building well surrounded on +the outside. I guess it's a scheme that even such crafty crooks as +Gallito and--" He paused and quailed a little under Flick's steady +regard, the "_you_" he had meant to say died on his lips. From neither +victor nor victim did Bob Flick ever permit a familiarity. "Yes, there's +no getaway possible," he substituted hastily. "It'd be foolish of you +boys to try and put up a fight." + +"I guess you're right," agreed Flick. "I guess we're too old and stiff +and tired to draw our guns unless there's a chance for us, anyway." +Flick rose with his usual languor. "Well, so long Mr.---- your name sure +does escape me." He strolled back to his companions, resuming his seat +in his usual unhurried and indifferent way. The curtains had not yet +parted, so he took occasion to relate to Gallito and Seagreave the +result of his conversation with Hanson, careless of the fact that the +latter sat watching them, gloating with malicious amusement over the +spectacle of the three of them so hopelessly entangled in the net and +yet engaging in the futile discussion of methods of escape. + +As Bob Flick whispered the scheme to the two men the gloom deepened on +Gallito's face. It seemed to him too comprehensive and efficacious to +evade. But Harry did not share his depression. As he listened his face +changed and set. In his eyes was a flash like sunlight on steel. He was +the old Seagreave again whom José had once described to Gallito. The +Seagreave whose mind worked with lightning rapidity, who ventured +anything, as gay and invincible he fought in the last ditch, his back to +the wall and all the odds against him. + +"I've got an idea," he said. "It may not work, but it's a chance." He +bent forward and in a rapid whisper outlined his plan for them. "I +wonder," he said, "if they'd nab me if I started to go over and talk to +Hughie? Do you suppose they would permit me a word with him?" + +Flick laughed. "Any number of them," he said. "If the rats they've +caught want to run around in the trap, what's that to them?" + +Seagreave had no opportunity to carry out his plan just then, for Hugh +began to play and Pearl made her second appearance. The very sight of +her, their vision of spring, who seemed to have sped up from the valley +far below and transformed the dark and dreary winter, brought the house +to its feet and sent a storm of applause ringing to the rafters. + +But she was spring no longer. In this dance of the seasons she was +giving them she now typified summer, splendid and glowing. Her gown was +a vivid green, spangled with gold and wreathed in roses. A festoon of +pink and crimson flowers lay about her neck, its long ends falling +almost to the foot of her frock, and her hair was crowned with roses. +And her dancing had changed. It was no longer the springtime she +portrayed, with all her plastic grace of motion, symbolizing its +delicate evanescence with arch hesitations and fugitive advances, and +all the playful joyousness of youth. + +On this second appearance she was dancing the summer and dancing it with +a passionate zest and spirit, alternated with enchanting languors. When +at last she ceased it seemed as if the encores which drew her back on +the stage again and again would never end. + +And the sheriff, noting this, stirred uneasily and whispered to a +grizzled companion: "I wish this was over, Lord, I do! Things don't look +quite so dead sure as they did. Gosh! She's got 'em all right in the +hollow of her hand." + +"It's her you got to reckon with," returned the companion gloomily. +"This blasted long winter's got the boys right on edge. They're jus' +spoiling for some deviltry or other, and if she comes out in front of +the curtain and makes an appeal to 'em, why, there'll be one of the +meanest scraps that's been seen in the mountains for some time." + +"You bet," agreed the sheriff. "What do you suppose that Seagreave's +chinning Hughie about." + +"God knows!" returned his pessimistic companion. "Nothing that's going +to help us any, you can stake your bottom dime on that. Here she comes +again, and you and me's just as big fools about her as the rest if we'd +let ourselves be." + +This time Pearl danced the autumn, a vision of crimson and gold, with +grape leaves wreathing her black hair. If Hugh had conveyed to her any +disturbing news during the intermission, she showed no trace of it in +her dancing, and if she had stirred her audience to impassioned +enthusiasm before, it was unlimited, almost frantic now. She was the +flame of autumn upon the mountain hillsides, a torch burning with the +joy of life and flinging her gay, defiant splendor in the menacing face +of winter. Before she had finished the house was on its feet, shouting +and clapping and refusing to let her leave the stage. + +"She's gone to their heads worse'n wine," muttered the sheriff. "I +suppose it's now she's goin' to ask 'em to stand by her, an' with +leaders like Gallito an' Bob Flick an' Harry Seagreave to line 'em up +an' carry things with a rush, where in hell are we?" + +But the dramatic appeal he had anticipated was not made. The Pearl, +after one recall after another, had thrown a final kiss to her +appreciative audience, had retired to her dressing room and positively +refused to appear again. + +The sheriff sat down limply for a moment. "I'm beat," he said to the man +who had shared his fears, "just beat. The Lord is sure on our side +to-night. Gosh! They had the whole thing in their own hands and didn't +know it. Well, the rest is pie. All we got to do is to take 'em all nice +an' quiet now, and probably not a gun drawed." He moved about giving his +orders to different men about the hall. + +Slowly the good-humored, laughing crowd filed out. The presence of the +sheriff and the various deputies aroused no suspicion. It was but +natural that any one who could get there from the surrounding camps +should be present. + +About half of the people had passed through the narrow door when Pearl +made her appearance at the back of the hall. She had thrust her arms +into a long, fur-lined crimson cloak, but it fell open from the neck +down, revealing her crimson and gold frock and gleaming emeralds. A +black lace mantilla was thrown over her head and half over her face, +showing only her sparkling eyes. She began taking various gay, little +steps, still full of that joy of movement which had possessed her all +evening. + +Those who remained in the hall began to laugh and applaud. She danced a +moment in response to it, and then, pausing, suddenly bowed low and +shook her head definitely. Then she wrapped her cloak closely about her, +turning up its wide, fur-lined collar, and, linking her arm with +Hughie's, came down the room with him still taking those irrepressible +little steps. Just as she reached the door she whisked a handkerchief +from a pocket in her cloak and held it to her nose. A waft of exquisite +perfume filled the air, but the eyes of the two deputies who guarded the +door were fixed with an almost stunned astonishment upon the jewels +which covered her bare hands. + +The sheriff had given orders that the Pearl and Hughie, Mrs. Thomas and +Mrs. Nitschkan were to be allowed to pass, were, in fact, to be got out +of the hall just as quickly as possible; but these orders had not been +clearly understood and the two deputies at the door halted Pearl, Hughie +and Mrs. Thomas, who was close to them. + +Before either Pearl or Hughie could protest Seagreave, who had been +about ten feet behind them, was at their side. "Let them pass," he said. +"Those are your orders." + +"I hadn't heard it," said the other man, "and I'm not taking my orders +from you." + +But the words were scarcely out of his mouth before Seagreave's arm, +that "left" which had floored many an opponent in the old days of his +middle-weight championship, shot out in a hook, lightning-like, to the +right side of the jaw of the nearest deputy. The man reeled under that +impact and went crashing over against his companion, bringing them both +in a heap to the floor. At the same moment Pearl, grasping Hughie's arm, +pulled him about the two who lay half stunned and was out of the door +like a flash. + +Mrs. Thomas, who had been taken into the confidence of the group only so +far as to have it impressed upon her that she uttered the word José at +her peril, and that the bandit's name was now Pedro, had not been quick +enough to follow Pearl and Hugh in their flight through the door and now +stood helplessly gazing about her, confused, almost dazed, by the whole +situation. + +The sheriff, whose attention had meanwhile been occupied by Mrs. +Nitschkan, who was creating a lusty disturbance in the middle of the +floor, ran forward, shouting orders. "Let 'em go, I tell you!" to those +who would have pursued the Pearl. "Where's your heads? I told you that +this hall had got to be cleared, and cleared quick, of the women. As for +you, Seagreave," catching Harry by the arm, "don't try to wriggle +through that door. You're under arrest." + +"Look here, sheriff, it's snowing heavily. Hugh's blind, as you know, +and can't possibly drive my horse up the hill. I drove Miss Gallito down +in my cart and was to drive her back. You know there's no earthly way +for me to escape, so if you let me drive those two up the hill, I'll +either come back here or you can get me in my cabin." + +"So that's your game, son!" the sheriff smiled cynically. "To stir the +boys up now. It's too late. They're all safe home, with their boots off, +and their wives talkin' to them. Even the girl couldn't make 'em forget +the honor of capturing Crop-eared José here in Colina, so run along, run +along. The girl's too pretty to be hurt with a frisky horse. My Lord!" +striding down the hall again, "you fools stop scrapping with that +termagant and put her out, put her out, I say." + +"Try it yourself," called Nitschkan tauntingly, enjoying to the full her +"hour of glorious strife," and resisting with perfect ease the vague and +chivalrous efforts of half a dozen deputies to hustle her from the hall. +"Any more of you try to mix it up with me and I'll put you all down for +the count." + +"Oh, Sadie, Sadie," cried Mrs. Thomas, running down the hall toward her +friend, "it do beat the dogs how you act. These gentlemen'll think +you're no lady. Do behave more refined." + +But Mrs. Nitschkan paid no heed to her pleadings. "Who's this José +you're all talking about?" she cried. "I know Pedro, but no José." + +Then she wasted no more breath in words, but gave herself strictly to +the business of the moment, prolonging the straggle far beyond the +patience of the sheriff and his men. But ultimately numbers prevailed, +and, although she resisted to the last moment, giving no quarter and +asking none, she was finally landed outside and the door locked upon +her. + +Swearing volubly, the sheriff turned his attention to that far end of +the hall where the deputies who had not been engaged in the struggle +with Mrs. Nitschkan stood guard over Gallito and Flick, who had ranged +themselves before the crimson curtain of Pearl's dressing room. Two men, +three, counting José behind the curtain, against at least twenty! +Hanson, from the back of the hall, yielded to his inclination to laugh. + +"They lined up just as I expected," muttered the sheriff as he advanced +down the room, "and it's a lot of good it's going to do them. Say," he +called to Flick and Gallito, "it ain't no use drawing your guns, boys. I +guess you two old hands got sense enough to see that. So all you got to +do is to hand over the prisoner. We'll tend to the rest of you later." + +"I guess you're all right"--Bob Flick's soft voice had a carrying +quality which caused his words to be heard all over the hall--"but we +all, Gallito and myself here, feel kind of puzzled. Of course, we see +right from the first what the game was and that you were after us, +but we ain't wise yet." + +[Illustration: "There stood the Black Pearl alone."] + +"Is that so?" sneered the sheriff. "Well, you soon will be. You step +aside from that curtain, and, Bob Flick, my men have orders to wing you +and Gallito both the minute you even start to throw your hands back." + +Gallito shrugged his shoulders and threw up his hands and Flick +laughingly waved his in the air. + +"I guess you're right there, Bill," he said. "You sure got the argument +of numbers. But say, boys, honest, what bug you all got in your heads? +You see in this land of the free you can't subject me and my friend +Gallito to such indignities as you're a heaping on us. As far as I can +make out, you're only laying up trouble for yourself, and also"--here +there rang a peculiarly menacing note through his soft, southern +voice--"if I'm correct, you're accusing Miss Pearl Gallito of being a +suspicious character, and I'm assuring you now, boys, that either in the +desert or here in the mountains that that's the sort of thing you've got +to answer for." + +"Stop your kidding, Bob," said the sheriff, impatiently. He took a rapid +stride forward and with one quick sweep of the arm ripped back the +curtain. + +Then he fell back staring, dumb with surprise. For there stood the Black +Pearl alone, a man's coat buttoned across her bare chest, and beneath it +the froth of her rose-colored silk petticoats. She stood nonchalantly +enough, her head thrown back, her hands on her hips, surveying the group +of men with a quick, disdainful smile, and then laughed insolently +across them at Hanson. + +"My Lord!" cried the sheriff, recovering himself, "how did you get here? +Why, you just went out of the door." + +"Gee! José dressed up in her clothes and made a getaway," called a +shrill voice from the rear. + +The sheriff swore audibly and violently as he ran to the door. "Here, +three of you boys," he ordered, "stay here and hold these prisoners. It +ain't ten minutes since the others left and there's no chance on earth +for 'em to escape. We'll have 'em before you know it. Come on, the rest +of you." + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +The morning dawned, but the Sheriff and his aids, their numbers +considerably increased by the various masculine inhabitants of Colina +who had joyously proffered their assistance--welcoming anything that +promised a little excitement after the wearing monotony of the +winter--were still seeking José, who seemed to have vanished in some +manner only to be explained as miraculous. + +Gallito, Bob Flick, Pearl and Hugh, Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas had +all been taken to the village hotel and were there under guard, while +Seagreave, also under guard, was permitted to remain temporarily, at +least, in his cabin. + +The reason for this was that the sheriff was beginning to turn over +certain rather vexing questions in his mind. Suppose, for instance, José +should really have made his escape, impossible as that feat appeared, +what definite, tangible proof had he that the crop-eared bandit had +really been harbored by Gallito? Only some vague statements made by a +woman to Hanson, a woman who thought that she had overheard a +conversation or several conversations between Gallito and Bob Flick. +There had undoubtedly been some one, some one whose interest it was not +to be caught, as the events of the previous night showed, but the +explanation they had all given, Flick, Gallito, Hugh, Seagreave and the +women, had struck the sheriff as extremely plausible, far more +plausible, in fact, than Hanson's story that Crop-eared José had been +secreted for months at a time in Gallito's cabin. + +The explanation which Gallito and all of his group had given was this. A +younger brother of Gallito, Pedro by name, had been visiting him for +some time. This youth had led a somewhat irregular life both in Spain +and in this country, and had become involved in several more or less +serious affairs; more, so Gallito averred, from a certain wildness and +recklessness of nature than from any criminal instincts. Several of his +companions had been arrested and, fearing that he would be also, he had +fled to Colina and begged Gallito to shelter him until it was safe for +him to go to work in one of the mines. + +The night before he had been very anxious to see Pearl dance in public, +and, not daring to sit in the audience for fear of being recognized by +some chance wayfarer, he had gained Pearl's consent to watch the +entertainment from the safe seclusion of her dressing room. + +Both Flick and Seagreave, who were in Gallito's confidence, believed +that the boy's fears were greatly exaggerated, but when they saw the +sheriff and all of his deputies in the hall their curiosity was aroused. +Flick had then gone over to speak to Hanson and Hanson's conversation +had convinced him that Pedro was really in danger and would be arrested +before the evening was over. They then devised the plan of having him +escape in Pearl's dancing dress and long cloak, meaning to drive him up +the hill and let him take his chances of eluding his would-be captors in +the forest surrounding Gallito's cabin. But he had slipped out of the +cart a short distance up the hill. Seagreave believed that there were a +pair of snow-shoes in the bottom of the cart, which had disappeared. +That was all any of them could say. + +But when Seagreave pointed out to the sheriff that if no one remained in +either his or Gallito's cabin, it was extremely likely that both +dwellings would be looted before nightfall, also that without the fires +made and kept up the provisions would freeze and that with a guard over +him, he would be as easy to lay hands on as if he were down at the hotel +with the rest, the sheriff gravely considered the matter and was +disposed to yield the point. As Seagreave remarked, he certainly had not +mastered the art of flying and he knew no other way by which he might +escape. "Poor Pedro!" he sighed. + +"You bet it's poor Pedro," said the sheriff grimly. "Why, you know as +well as I do, Seagreave, that there ain't no way on God's green earth +for that boy to make a getaway. Of course, he's given us a lot of +bother, what with that damned snow falling again last night and covering +up any tracks he might make, but we're bound to get him. Why, a little +army, if it had enough ammunition, could hold Colina against the world. +When you got a camp that's surrounded by cañons about a thousand foot +deep, how you going to get into it, if the folks inside don't want you? +Now, take that, boy! How's he going to strike the main roads and the +bridges in the dead of night, especially when the bridges is all so +covered over with drifts that you can't see 'em by day? And, anyway, the +crust of the snow won't hold him in lots of places. 'Course he may +flounder 'round some, but there's no possible chance for him, and I'm +thinking that the coyotes'll get him before we do." + +To this Seagreave agreed, and after the sheriff had further relieved his +feelings by some vitriolic comments upon Hanson, he granted him +permission to look after the two cabins, and indifferently ordered the +deputy in charge to go down the hill and get his breakfast at the hotel, +remarking with rough humor that he'd leave Seagreave the prisoner of the +mountain peaks and he guessed they'd keep him safe all right. + +So the two men, their appetites sharpened by a night spent in searching +for the fugitive, took their way down toward the village, and it was not +long thereafter that Pearl, having secured permission to go up to the +cabin and make some changes in her clothing, wearily climbed the hill. +The lacks in her costume had been temporarily supplied by the +inn-keeper's wife, but these makeshifts irked her fastidious spirit. + +She had suggested that Mrs. Nitschkan and Mrs. Thomas go with her, but +they were too thoroughly enjoying the limelight in which they found +themselves to consider trudging up to their isolated cabin. Mrs. Thomas, +in a pink glow of excitement, cooed and smiled and fluttered her lashes +at half a dozen admirers, while Mrs. Nitschkan recounted to an +interested group just where and how she had shot her bears. + +"Say, have you took in the sheriff?" Mrs. Thomas found occasion to +whisper to Mrs. Nitschkan. "He's an awful good looker, an' I think he +got around that hall so stylish last night." + +"What eyes he's got ain't for you," answered the gypsy cruelly. "He's +kept his lamps steady on Pearl." + +"That's all you know about it," returned Mrs. Thomas with some spirit. +"He sat beside me at the table this morning and squeezed my hand twice +when I passed him the flap-jacks. He's a real man, he is, an' likes a +woman to be a woman, an' not a grizzly bear like you or a black panther +like that Pearl." + +Pearl's progress up the hill was necessarily slow. The wagons had cut +the snow into great ruts which made walking difficult, and where it was +smoother it was exceedingly slippery. But her weariness soon vanished +under the stimulus of the fresh morning air. Even the exertion of +dancing the evening before and the night of excitement which followed +had left no trace. She was, indeed, a tireless creature and supple as a +whalebone. So, after a few moments' exercise in the exhilaratingly pure +air, the sparkle returned to her eye, the color to her cheek, and her +step had regained its usual light buoyancy. + +Although March had come with its thaws, there was no suggestion of +spring in the landscape. From the white, monotonous expanse of snow rose +bleak, skeleton shapes of trees lifting bare, black boughs to the +snow-sodden clouds. Upon either side of the road lay a forest of +desolation--varied only by the sad, dull green of the wind-blown +pines--which stretched away and away until it became a mere blue shadow +as unsubstantial as smoke on the mountain horizon; and yet spring, still +invisible and to be denied by the doubting, was in the air, with all its +soft intimations of bud and blossom and joyous life; and spring was in +Pearl's heart as she hastened up the hill toward Seagreave. It brushed +her cheek like a caress, it touched her lips like a song. + +When she was about a quarter of a mile up from the village she crossed a +little bridge which spanned a deep and narrow crevasse, a gash which +cleft the great mountain to its foundation. Pearl lingered here a moment +to rest, and, leaning her arms on the railing, looked down curiously +into the mysterious depths so far below. + +The white walls of the sharp, irregular declivity reflected many cold, +prismatic lights, and down, far down where the eye could no longer +distinguish shapes and outlines, there lay a shadow like steam from some +vast, subterranean cauldron, blue, dense, impenetrable. It fascinated +Pearl and she stood there trying to pierce the depths with her eye, +until at last, recalled to herself by the chill in the wind, she again +turned and hastened up the hill. But before seeking Seagreave and asking +him to share his breakfast with her, she followed the instincts of her +inherent and ineradicable coquetry and, stopping at her father's cabin, +made a toilet, slipping into one of her own gowns and rearranging her +hair. Then, throwing a long cape about her and adjusting her mantilla, +she closed the door behind her and turned into the narrow trail which +led at sharp right angles to the road to Saint Harry's cabin. It was, +Pearl reflected, almost like walking through the tunnel of a mine; the +snow walls on either side of her were as high as her head. Occasionally +the green fringes of a pine branch tapped her cheek sharply with their +rusty needles. Then the tunnel widened to a little clearing where stood +the cabin, picturesque with the lichened bark of the trees on the +rough-hewn logs. + +Seagreave had evidently seen her coming, for before she lifted her hand +to knock he threw open the door. "Ah," he cried, a touch of concern in +his voice, "I was just going down to the other cabin to make up the +fires before you came. If you stopped there you must have found it cold, +and you did stop," his quick eye noting the change she had effected in +her costume. + +"Yes," she smiled, "they wouldn't let me come up the hill in José's coat +and my rose petticoats, and I felt like a miner in the clothes they lent +me." She had entered the cabin and had taken the chair he had pushed up +near the crackling, blazing fire of logs which he had just finished +building to his satisfaction. The bond of sympathy between Seagreave and +José was probably that they both performed all manual tasks with a sort +of beautiful precision. Gallito had characterized Harry's cabin as the +cell of a monk. It was indeed simple and plain to austerity, and yet it +possessed the beauty of a prevailing order and harmony. Shelves his own +hands had made lined the rough walls and were filled with books; beside +the wide fireplace was an open cupboard, displaying his small and +shining store of cooking utensils. For the rest a table or two and a few +chairs were all the room contained. + +It was the first time Pearl had ever been in the cabin, and, although +she maintained the graceful languor of her pose, lying back a little +wearily in her chair, yet her narrow, gleaming eyes pierced every corner +of the room, with avid eagerness absorbing the whole, and then returning +for a closer and more penetrating study of details, as if demanding from +this room where he lived and thought a comprehensive revelation of him, +a key to that remote, uncharted self which still evaded her. + +Seagreave himself, whose visible presence was, for the time, outside the +field of her conjecture, was busy preparing her breakfast, and now, +after laying the cloth, he placed a chair for her at the table and +announced that everything was ready. He seated himself opposite her and +Pearl's heart thrilled at the prospect of this intimate _tête-a-tête_, +the color rose on her cheek, her lashes trembled and fell. + +"Where's José?" she said hastily, to cover her slight, unusual +embarrassment. "Tell me quick how you managed it. Neither Bob nor Pop +could tell me because someone was always with us." + +"Ah," he said, "the gods were with us, but it was a wild chance, I +assure you. Fortunately, it was still snowing. Hugh and José were +already in the cart and everyone else had hastened home as fast as he or +she could go. The boys would not have waited for me if I had not dashed +out just when I did, and I was glad enough to escape, for I was afraid +they would make some mistake in the road, Hugh not being able to see, +and José familiar with the village only through our description of it. I +wasted no time in jumping into the cart and then drove like Jehu to the +Mont d'Or, fortunately on our way up the hill." + +"The Mont d'Or!" she interjected in surprise. "But why did you stop +there?" + +He shrugged his shoulders significantly. "It is José's shelter. He had +the keys of the engine room. Your father had sent them to him, and with +them he let himself in, and then locked the door behind him. We got a +fair start, of course, but it was only a few moments after we reached +here that three or four of the deputies were on our heels." + +"Ah," she cried, "they thought you had driven him here." + +"Naturally, and it is unnecessary to say that they spent several hours +in searching, not only this cabin, but your father's and Mrs. +Nitschkan's to boot, and also the stable yonder." He pointed to a little +shed farther up the hill where he kept his horse and cart. He held out +his coffee cup for her to refill and laughed heartily. "I have no doubt +that they will return at intervals during the day to see if there isn't +some tree-top or ledge of rock that they may have overlooked; but at +present they are too busy exploring every nook and cranny of the various +mines, especially the Mont d'Or." + +She put down the coffee pot with a clatter and threw herself back in her +chair with a gesture of intense disappointment. "Then surely they will +find José!" she cried. + +"Oh, you do not know," he exclaimed. "Wait; it was stupid of me not to +have explained. Your father is a wonderful man. He overlooks nothing. He +foresaw that in spite of all precautions, José--and other friends of +his," there was a trace of hesitation in his tones in speaking to her of +her father's chosen companions, "might be trapped here in the winter +time when they could not escape over the one or two secret trails which +he knows and which he has shown José. So, long ago, working secretly and +overtime in the Mont d'Or, he hollowed out a small chamber. It is above +one of the unworked stopes and its entrance defies detection." + +"But are you sure?" she interjected earnestly. "Have you seen it +yourself?" + +"Yes, I was with José the first time Gallito showed it to him. Then he, +your father, took us over the other parts of the mine and brought us +back to the same spot to see if we could discover the hiding place for +ourselves. I assure you we could not. Neither José nor myself liked +being baffled in that way, for it seemed to us that we went over every +inch of the ground, and your father stood there laughing at us in that +sarcastic way of his. Finally we gave up the search and Gallito marked +it, so that it might be found in a hurry. It is above one's head and the +wall is too smooth to climb in order to reach it--" + +"How can José get in then?" interrupted Pearl. + +"José has a key to your father's locker, and in that locker he keeps a +rope ladder. José throws up the ladder and the hooks catch on a dark, +narrow little ledge; climbing up to this, he finds a small opening; he +wriggles into this and finds himself in a small chamber which your +father always keeps well provisioned. From this chamber a narrow passage +leads up to the surface of the ground, thus providing two exits; but, of +course, the one above ground cannot be used now, owing to the snow." + +Pearl, who had been listening breathlessly to this description of José's +hiding place, leaned back with a sigh of relief. "Then it looks as if +José might be all right for the present. I do hope so for all our +sakes." + +She sat silent for a few moments, apparently turning over something in +her mind. When she spoke again her manner showed a certain +embarrassment. "Do--do you know," she asked rather hesitatingly, "how +they got the information?" + +"No," he replied. "And that is what is puzzling all of us, but they have +so far refused to tell us." + +Almost she uttered a prayer of thankfulness. She very strongly suspected +that the only way Hanson could have secured the information was through +her mother's inveterate habit of eavesdropping, a weakness of hers which +she had failed to hide from her daughter, and a feeling almost of +gratitude came over Pearl that so far Hanson had been decent enough to +spare that poor babbler. + +She took a last sip of coffee and rose from the table. "I must go down +to the other cabin," she said, reluctance in her heart, if not in her +voice. + +"I will go with you"--Seagreave rose with alacrity to accompany +her--"and get the fires builded. It should really have been done long +ago. But what am I thinking of? Wait a moment." He clapped his hand to +his pocket. "One never knows what avenues of cleverness and cunning a +great temptation may open up." He laughed a little. "On that wild drive +to the Mont d'Or I insisted on José removing your necklace and all your +rings with which he had decked himself. I dare say it cost him +immeasurable pangs, but he had no time to express them. As I was driving +he passed them over to Hugh, and when we reached here Hugh gave them to +me. He explained that in attempting to give them to you he might be +seen, and if he were it might lead to some embarrassing questions." + +He drew from his pocket first the emeralds and then the rings, laying +them carefully upon the table, where they formed a glittering heap. + +"I don't think it is possible that José withheld anything," Seagreave +continued. "He would not dare, and I am quite sure that neither Hughie +nor I dropped even a ring when he gave them to me. Still I would be very +much obliged if you will look them over and see if they are intact." + +At the sight of her treasures Pearl uttered an exclamation of pleasure +and fingered them lovingly, laying the emeralds against her cheek with a +gesture that was almost a caress. "Thank you. Oh, it was good of you to +think of them at such a time and rescue them for me." Her soft, sliding +voice was warm with gratitude. "They are all here." She slipped the +rings on her fingers, her eyes dreaming on them. She fastened the +emeralds about her neck and hid them beneath her gown, pressing them +against her flesh as if she found pleasure in their cold contact. + +She lifted her eyes to him; her smile was languourously ardent; +impulsively she caught his hand and held it for a moment against her +cheek. He started and she felt him tremble. Then hastily he withdrew his +hand, murmuring at the same time a confused, almost inarticulate +protest; but Pearl did not wait to hear it. She had risen abruptly and, +catching up her cloak and wrapping it hastily about her, had opened the +door before he could reach it and had stepped out into the snow. + +Seagreave, who had paused a moment to close the door behind them, heard +her utter a sharp exclamation and turned quickly. + +"Dios!" she cried. "Dios! What is it?" + +She had fallen back against the wall of the cabin and was gazing about +her with a strange and startled expression. Seagreave's eye reflected it +as he too stared about him with a look not yet of alarm but of wild, +deep wonder. For the moment, at least, all things were the same. Above +them the peaks towered whitely in the sullen, gray sky. On a level with +their eyes, the illimitable forests of bare, black trees mingling with +the denser and more compact shapes of the evergreens, stretched away +over the hillsides, casting their long blue shadows on the snow-covered +ground until they wore blurred indistinguishably in the violet haze of +distance. Unchanged, and yet so strong was the presage of some +unimagined and disastrous event, that when a long shiver ran through the +earth Pearl screamed aloud, and, stumbling toward Seagreave, reached out +gropingly for his hand. + +For the second that they waited the earth, too, seemed to wait, a +solemn, awe-filled moment of incalculable change, a tense moment, as if +the unknown, mysterious forces of nature were gathering themselves +together for some mighty, unprecedented effort. + +Then shiver after shiver shook the ground, the earth trembled as if in +some deep convulsion, the white peaks seemed bowing and bending--then a +roar as of many waters, the air darkened and earth and sky seemed filled +with the mass of the mountains slipping down--down to chaos. + +Pearl had ceased to scream and had fallen to her knees, clinging +desperately to Seagreave. Her face was blanched white with terror, and +she was muttering incoherent prayers. + +As for Harry, he had forgotten her, forgotten himself, and was living +through moments or centuries, he knew not, which, of wonder and horror. + +And what a sight! It was not simply a great mountain of snow slipping +thunderously down to the valleys beneath; but in its ever gathering +momentum and incredible velocity it tore great rocks from the ground and +either snapped off trees as if they had been straws, or wholly uprooted +them, and now was a fast-flying mass of snow, earth, trees and rocks +whirling and hurtling through the air. + +A huge rock had, as if forcibly detaching itself, flown off from the +avalanche and buried itself in the ground only a few feet beyond Harry +and Pearl, and more than one uprooted tree lay near them. Death had +missed them by only a few paces. + +Not realizing her immunity even after the air had begun to clear, and +still panic-stricken and fearful of what might still occur, Pearl +continued to moan and pray until Seagreave, who had been so dazed that +he had been almost in a state of trance, again became aware of her +presence and, partially realizing her piteous state of terror, lifted +her in his arms and, wrapping them about her, endeavored to soothe her +and allay her fears, although he had not yet sufficiently recovered +himself to know fully what he was doing, and was merely following the +instinct of protection. + +It was impossible for him to realize the mundane again immediately after +these undreamed of and supernormal experiences. Holding Pearl, who still +clung to him frantically, cowering and trembling against him, he leaned +upon the rough, projecting walls of his cabin and gazed with awed and +still unbelieving eyes into this new and formless world, yet obscured +with flying snow. + +Gradually as the air cleared he saw that a new world, indeed, lay before +them. "Look, look, Pearl," he cried, hoping to rouse her from her state +of blind fright. "It has been an avalanche and it is over now." + +"No, no," she moaned, and buried her head more deeply in his shoulder. +"I dare not look up. It will come again." + +"No, it doesn't happen twice. It is over now and we are safe and the +cabin is safe." + +And yet, in spite of himself, he sympathized with her fear more than he +would have admitted either to himself or her. Anything seemed possible +to him now. He had looked upon a miracle. He had seen those immutable +peaks, as stable as Time, bend and bow in their strange, cosmic dance, +for the change in the position of one had created the illusory effect of +a change in all. + +"Come, look up, Pearl," he urged. "It is all over and everything is +changed. Look up and get accustomed to it." + +Everything was indeed changed. For a few yards before the cabin his path +with its white, smooth walls was intact, but beyond that lay an +incredibly smooth expanse of bare earth. The road was obliterated; the +vast projecting rock ledges which had overshadowed it had disappeared. +They had all been razed or else uprooted like the rocks and trees and +carried on in that irresistible rush. The light poured baldly down upon +a hillside bare and blank and utterly featureless. But far down the road +where the bridge had spanned the cañon there rose a vast white mountain, +effectually cutting them off from all communication with the village +below. + +Nothing remained of familiar surroundings. This was, indeed, a new +world. At last Seagreave roused himself from his stunned contemplation +of it and bent himself to the task of coaxing Pearl to lift her head and +gaze upon it, too. + +At last she did so, but at the sight of that bare and unfamiliar +hillside her terrors again overcame her. "Come," she cried, dragging at +his arm, "we must go--go--get away from here. Dios! Are you mad? It is +the end of the world. Come quickly." + +"Where?" asked Seagreave gently. + +"Home," she cried wildly. "To the church. We can at least die +blessedly." + +Seagreave shook his head, his eyes on that white wall--that snow +mountain which rose from the edge of the crevasse and seemed almost to +touch the sky. "Listen, Pearl," he spoke more earnestly now, as if to +force some appreciation of the situation upon her mind. "This cabin is +the only thing upon the mountain. The avalanche has carried everything +else away." + +"Not my father's cabin, too," she peered down the hill curiously, yet +fearfully, in a fascinated horror. "Oh, but it is true. It is gone. Oh, +what shall we do? But we must get down to the camp. Come, come." + +But for once Seagreave seemed scarcely to hear her. He had leaned out +from the sheltering wall and was scanning with a measuring and +speculative eye the white heap that rose from the edge of the cañon and +seemed almost to touch the lowering and sullen sky. + +"Thank God, the camp is safe," he murmured. "The cañon must have saved +it, or else it would have been wiped off the earth just as Gallito's +cabin has been. But it has swept the bridge away, of course." + +"Oh, come." Pearl dragged at his sleeve. "I can't stay here. I am +afraid." + +"Pearl," and there were both anxiety and tenderness in his voice. "You +must understand. Try to realize that there is no way to get down." + +"But there must be some way," she insisted, "with snow-shoes--" + +He shook his head gently but definitely. "There is no way. We might as +well face it." He cast another long look at the sky. "It is the season +for the thaws, the big thaws, but, even so, it will take time to melt +down that mountain out there. No, it is useless to argue," as Pearl +began again her futile rebellion against the inexorable forces of +nature, "but what am I thinking of?" in quick self-reproach. "You must +not stay out here in the cold any longer. Come." He threw open the cabin +door. + +But if Pearl heard him she gave no sign, but still leaned weakly, almost +inertly, against the walls of the cabin, gazing down the hillside with +dazed and still frightened eyes. + +Seeing her condition, Seagreave wasted no more words, but lifted her in +his arms and carried her into the room they had so recently left. There +he placed her in a chair and pushed it near the fire and she sat +shivering and cowering, her hands outstretched to the blaze. + +The light from the fire streamed through the room and Pearl, cheered and +restored more by that homely and familiar radiance than by any words of +comfort he might have uttered, gradually sank further and further back +in her chair and presently closed her eyes. It seemed to him that she +slept. At first her rest was fitful, broken by exclamations and starts, +but each time that she opened her eyes she saw the familiar and +unchanged surroundings, and Seagreave sitting near her; and, reassured, +her sleep became more natural and restful. + +When she awoke it was to find herself alone. Seagreave had left, but she +could hear him moving about in the next room, near at hand if she needed +him. He was evidently bringing in some logs for the fire. + +"As if nothing had happened," she muttered, "and things will go on just +the same. We shall eat; we shall sleep. How can it be?" + +She got up and began to walk up and down the room. She was young, she +was strong, and the shock of those few moments of wonder and horror had +almost worn off. Her active brain was alert and normal again, and she +thought deeply as she walked to and fro, considering all possible phases +of her present situation. + +Then, ceasing to pace back and forth, she leaned against the window and +looked out. The strange, new world lay before her, an earth bereft of +its familiar forests, and which must send forth from its teeming heart a +new growth of tender, springtime shoots to cover its nakedness. And as +she gazed the sun burst through the gray clouds and poured down upon the +wide, bare hillside an unbroken flood of golden splendor. + +Hearing a slight sound behind her, she turned quickly. Seagreave had +entered and, approaching the window, stood looking at the white sloping +plain without. + +"I couldn't chop any more wood," he said. "It seemed too commonplace +after this thing that we have seen. But you--how are you?" + +"I'm all right," she returned. But she did not meet his eyes; her black +lashes lay long on her cheek; her cheek burned. She realized in a +confused way that there was some change in their relative positions. She +had always felt because of his reticence, his withdrawal into self, his +diffidence in approaching her, easily mistress of any situation which +might arise between them; but since those moments when they two had +gazed upon the avalanche, and she in her terror had flung herself upon +his breast, and had wrapped her arms about him and buried her face in +his shoulder, he had assumed not only the tone but the manner of +authority and had adopted again a natural habit of command, dropped or +laid aside from indifference or inertia, but instinctively resumed when +through some powerful feeling he became again his normal self, alive and +alert, vigorous and enthusiastic. It was as if he had suddenly awakened +to a whole world of new possibilities and new opportunities. + +Beneath his long, steady gaze her own eyelids fluttered and fell; her +cheeks flushed a deeper rose; her heart beat madly. She was furious at +herself for these revealing weaknesses, and yet she, too, was conscious +of new, undreamed-of possibilities, sweet, poignantly sweet. + +"Pearl," his voice was low, shaken by the emotion which had overtaken +both of them, "do you know that, as far as you and I are concerned, we +are the only living human beings in all our world?" + +She looked at him and, unknown to herself, her face still held its glow +of rapture; her eyes were pools of love. + +Her little rill of laughter was broken and shaken as falling water. "The +sheriff didn't get us, and yet we're prisoners, prisoners of the snow." + +"And you, my jailer, will you be kind to me?" But there was nothing +pleading in his tone. It rang instead with exultant triumph. + +"Why, Pearl"--a virile note of power as if some long-dreamed-of mastery +were his at last swelled like a diapason through his voice--"we're in +for a thaw, a big thaw, but it will take time to melt down that mountain +out there in the crevasse; and you and I are here--alone--for a +fortnight, at least a fortnight." He emphasized the words, lingering +over them as if they afforded him delight. + +"A fortnight! Here! Alone with you!" she cried. "Never, never. There +must be a way--" she murmured confusedly and ran to the window to hide +her agitation and embarrassment, pulling the curtain hastily aside and +looking out unseeingly over the hills. She was trembling from head to +foot. + +The wind had risen and was wailing and shrieking over the bare hill and +the air was dim with flying snow; but the spring that hours before had +kissed her cheek and touched her lips like a song rose now in Pearl's +heart. She pressed her tightly clasped hands against her breast and +closed her eyes. A new world! And she and Harry were in it together--and +alone. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +The dawns rose, the suns set, after the avalanche as before, and Pearl +and Seagreave, alone in the cabin, isolated from the world of human +beings, took up their lives together, together and yet apart, in the +great, encompassing silence of this white and winter-locked world. + +Winter-locked, yes, but all the mighty, unseen forces of Nature were set +toward spring. Nothing could stop or retard them now. Under sullen, +lowering skies; beneath the blasts which swept down from the peaks; in +spite of flying snow; unseen, unsuspected, in the darkness and stillness +and warmth of the earth, the transformation was going on. The tender, +young banners of green were almost ready for the decking of the trees, +and almost completed was the weaving of pink and blue and lavender +carpets of wild flowers for the hillsides. + +And the spring that had arisen glorious in Pearl's heart when she had +realized that she and Harry were prisoners of the avalanche was still +resurgent. For the first day or two of their isolation she lived, +breathed, moved in the splendor of her heart's dream. It encompassed her +with the warmth and radiance of a flood of sunshine. + +In spite of her protests and appeals, Seagreave would not permit her to +help much with the household tasks, but busied himself almost constantly +with them, maintaining with a sort of methodical pleasure the inspired +order of his cabin. It is possible that he gave to each task a more +exhaustive and undeviating attention than even he considered necessary, +and this to cover the sense of embarrassment he felt in adapting himself +not only to this pervasive, feminine presence, but to the exigencies of +an unwonted companionship hedged about with restrictions. + +He often felt as if he were entertaining a bird of brilliant tropical +plumage in his cabin, as if it had flown thither from glowing southern +lands and brought with it sensuous memories of color and fragrance, and +wafts of sandalwood. + +Sometimes he and Pearl walked about on the barren hillside, constantly +washed more bare of snow by the daily rains which had begun to fall, and +sometimes he read aloud to her a little, but in spite of Pearl's +intelligence she had never cared much for books. She craved no record of +another's emotions and struggles and passions. No life at second hand +for her. She was absorbed in the living. + +But if in the day there were many tasks to be done, and Harry could +occupy more or less time in the hewing of wood and carrying of water, +and all of the practical duties which that phrase may stand for, there +were long evenings when he and Pearl sat in the firelight, their speech +and their silence alike punctuated by the wail of the mountain wind +about the cabin and the singing of the burning logs upon the hearth. + +And it was during those evening hours that Seagreave felt most the +shyness which her constant presence induced in him. By day he busied +himself in securing her comfort, but by night he was tormented by his +own chivalrous and fastidious thought of her, by his desire to reassure +her mind, without words, if possible, as to the consequences of their +isolation. + +But sometimes after he had lighted her candle and she had said +good-night, and had entered the little room where she slept, he would +either sit beside the glowing embers or else build up afresh the great +fire which was never permitted to die out night or day during the winter +months, his thoughts full of her, dwelling on her, clinging to the +memories of the day. + +José's personality had been neither ubiquitous nor dominating. Seagreave +had noticed him no more about the cabin than he had the little mountain +brook which purled its way down the hill; but now his housemate was +feminine, and with every passing hour he was more conscious of it. At +night, after Pearl had gone to bed, he felt her presence as definitely +as though she were still there. Some quality of her individuality +lingered and haunted the room and haunted his thoughts as the sweet, +unfamiliar odor of an exotic blossom permeates the atmosphere and +remains, even when the flower is gone. + +And as for Pearl, whether she walked on the barren hillsides or dreamed +by the fire, or stood at the window watching Harry chop wood or carry +water from the rushing mountain brook, her mind held but one thought, +her heart but one image--him. + +The studious abstraction, the ordered calm which characterized +Seagreave's cabin, made fragrant by burning pine logs and fresh with the +cold winds from the mountain tops, had altered by imperceptible and +subtle gradations until the atmosphere was now strangely electrical, +throbbing with vital life, glowing with warmth and color. In outer +semblance nothing was changed, no more than was the appearance of the +world outside, and yet beneath the surface of the lives in the cabin, as +beneath the surface of the earth without, all the mighty forces of +Nature were bent to one end. + +Without, the spring thaws which were to melt down the mountain of snow +in the ravine below were no longer presaged, but at hand. The rain fell +for hours each day, but the dull and weeping skies, the heavy air, +oppressed Seagreave's spirits and made him now sad and listless, but for +the most part curiously restless. + +Strive as he would, he could not escape nor ignore it, this atmosphere +of the exotic which filled his cabin, the atmosphere of Pearl's beauty +and magnetism and of her love for him. He did not recognize it as that. +He only felt it as some strange, disturbing element which, while it +troubled his thought, yet claimed it. His growing love for her filled +him with a sort of terror. It seemed to him a mounting tide which would +sweep him, he knew not whither, and with all the strength of his nature +he struggled to hold to the resolution he had made the first day they +were alone in the cabin, not to press his love upon her until she had +left the shelter of his roof and was back again with her father. + +One evening the two sat in the cabin together, as usual, Seagreave on +one side of the fire reading--that is, his eyes were upon the book and +he seemed apparently absorbed in its contents--but in reality his entire +thought was focused upon Pearl, who sat opposite him in a low chair, her +hands clasped idly in her lap, and he struggled desperately to maintain +his attitude of friendly comradeship when he addressed her. + +The leaping of the flames on the hearth made quaint arabesques of shadow +on the rough walls and the wind sighed and sobbed in the chimney. Thus +they sat for an hour or two in silence and then Seagreave lifted his +eyes and stole one of his swift and frequent glances at Pearl. Something +he saw riveted his attention and he continued to gaze, forgetful of his +book, of his past resolutions, of anything in the world but her. + +She was just loosening the cord which bound the throat of a small black +leather bag, and while he watched her she poured its contents into her +lap and sat bending over a handful of loose and sparkling jewels. She +was not aware of his scrutiny, but sat in complete absorption, her dark, +shining head bent over them, lifting them, turning them this way and +that to catch the firelight, letting them trickle through her long, +brown fingers. + +There, sparkling in the fire-glow, was the desire of the world, the +white, streaming flame of diamonds, the heart's blood of rubies, and +sapphires--the blue of the sea and the sky--all their life and radiance +imprisoned in a dew-drop. + +"How beautiful they are!" he cried involuntarily, but what he really +meant was, "How beautiful you are!" + +She started and looked up at him in surprise. "Yes, they are," she said. +"I have been gathering them for a long time. There are only a few, but +every one is flawless." + +"I never considered jewels before." He bent forward the better to see +them. "I have often seen women wear them, but I just regarded them as a +part of their decoration. Yet I can understand now why you love them. +They are very beautiful, unset that way." He looked at her deeply. "But +I believe it is for some reason deeper than that that they have a +fascination for you. You are like them." + +She let them fall like drops of rainbow water through her fingers; then +she lifted her lashes. "Am I hard and cold like them?" She sent darting +and dazzling full in his eyes her baffling, heart-shivering smile. + +He did not answer at once, and she, still gazing at him, saw that he +paled visibly, every tinge of color receding from his face; his eyes, +deep and dark, held hers, as if reading her soul and demanding that she +reveal the strange secrets of her nature. + +The forces of life ready to burst through the harsh crust of the earth +without and express themselves in the innocent glory of flower and grass +and tender, green leaves, and the sound of birds, were now seeking +expression through denser and more complex human avenues. All the love, +all the longing which Seagreave had so sternly suppressed during these +days he and Pearl had spent together, rose in his heart and threatened +to sweep away in a mighty tide of elemental impulses all of those +resolutions of restraint to which he had clung so hardly. + +He arose and leaned his arm on the mantel-piece, still gazing at her as +if he could never withdraw his eyes. "You are so--so beautiful," he +stammered, scarcely knowing what he said. "The world will claim you. You +have so much to give it and all your nature, all your heart turns to it. +You will soon forget this hut in the mountains, and--and all that it has +meant." He buried his head in his arms. + +She, too, rose and laid the handful of her jewels on the table without +another glance at them. "These mountains!" She threw wide her arms and +drew a long, ecstatic breath. She came near to him and touched his arm. +"I hated them once, I love them now." She smiled up at him, her darkly +slumbrous, scarlet-lipped smile. + +He leaned toward her as if to clasp her close, but the vows he had sworn +to himself a thousand times since she had been in his cabin alone with +him still held him. Slowly he drew back and with all the strength of his +nature fought for self-control. He called upon every force of his will, +and in that supreme moment his face hardened to the appearance of a +sculptured mask; all of its finely-drawn outlines seemed set in stone. + +She turned angry shoulders to him and stirred the stones on the table +with impatient fingers until they rolled about, flashing darts of light. +Symbols of power, of material and deadening splendor; eternal +accompaniments of imperial magnificence! The sapphires sang triumph, the +diamonds conquest, the rubies passionate and fulfilled love. + +"They are what you really care for." He spoke huskily; his voice sounded +thick and uncertain in his ears. "That and--and your wonderful dancing, +and applause--and success and money. It's natural that you should--but +it all makes me realize--clearly, that I can't even try to force myself +into your life. There's no place for me. Even--even if you were +kind--you sometimes seem to--to--to suggest that you would be--I'd be +just a useless cog, soon to be dropped. It's all complete without me. +But, for God's sake, I'm begging you, I'm begging you, Pearl, not to be +kind to me for the rest of the time that we're here together." + +"And what about me?" she flashed. "You've thought everything out from +your own side, and you've just been telling it. Don't you think I've got +a side, too? I guess so." + +He looked at her in surprise, the emotion that had changed and broken +his expression fading into wonderment and puzzle. + +"What do you mean?" he asked. + +"Kiss me, and I'll show you," she said audaciously. All the allurement, +the softness and sweetness of the south was in her mouth and eyes. + +"How can we go on like this?" His voice was a mere broken whisper. He +yearned to her, leaned toward her, and yet refrained from holding her. + +"Like _this_," she murmured, and threw her arms about him and laid her +head on his heart, her face upturned to his. + +"I told you"--so close was she held that she scarcely knew that she was +breathing--"I told you--that if I once held you in my arms I'd never let +you go." + +"You may have told yourself; you never told me before. But I'm content." + +"Content! That's no word for this," he cried between kisses. The +mounting tide he had feared had become a mighty torrent sweeping away +all his carefully built up mental barriers, and with that obliterating +flood came a sense of power and freedom. All the youth in his heart rose +and claimed its share of life and love and happiness. + +"Let me go," she said at last, and drew away from him, flushed as a dawn +and rapturous as a sunrise. + +"No, never again," and stretched out his arms, but she slipped behind +the table, putting it between them. "Sit down," she commanded, "and +build up the fire. I want to talk, talk a long time, all night maybe." + +"I hope so," he said ardently, and, obeying her, stooped to place fresh +logs on the embers. "But what is there to talk about? We've said and +will continue to say all there is in the world worth saying. I love you. +Do you love me?" + +"Maybe you won't want to say that after you've heard me." She had +leaned forward, her arms on her knees, her eyes on the flames which +leaped from dry twig to dry twig of the burning logs and on the shower +of sparks which every minute or so swept up the chimney. + +"You hit it off pretty well when you said that all I really cared for +was money and jewels and my dancing and the big audiences and all that." +Her eyes had narrowed so that the gleaming light that shone through her +lashes was like a mere line of fire. "You see, I got to play the game. I +got to. Nothing but winning and winning big ever's going to suit me. I +saw that when I was awful young. I sort of looked out on life and it +seemed to me that most people spent their lives like flies, flying +around a while without any purpose, trying to buzz in the sun if they +could, and by and by dropping off the window pane." + +"Nothing but winning will suit you," he said drearily. "You are only +repeating what I told you." All the life, the passion had gone out of +his voice. "And I'm no prize, heaven knows!" + +"I ain't through yet," she said. "I never did talk much. I guess I'm +going to talk more to-night than I ever talked in my life, but I always +saw everything that was going on around me, and it didn't take me long +to make out that all you'll get in life is a kick and a crust if you +haven't got some kind of power in your hands." + +"God, you're hard, hard as iron!" The room rang with the echoes of his +mirthless laughter. "Five, three minutes ago, you were in my arms, soft, +yielding, trembling, giving me back kiss for kiss, and now you sit +there expounding your merciless philosophy." + +"It ain't me that's merciless," she returned, apparently unmoved, "it's +life. You think my dancing's great, so does everybody; so it is. Well, +it didn't grow. I made it." Here she lifted her head with pride, and +folded her arms on her chest. "Maybe you don't think it took some +training. Maybe you don't think it took some will and grit when I was a +little kid to keep right on at my exercises when I ached so bad that the +tears would run down my cheeks all the time I was at them. My mother +knew that you had to begin young and keep at 'em all the time, but mom +never would have had the nerve to keep me to it. She used often to cry +with me. + +"When I was a girl I'd liked to have had a good time, just in that +careless way like other girls, but I gave that up, too, so's I could +work at my dancing. When I'd get tired and blue I'd look at the stones +I'd begun to collect with the money I'd earned. I'm hard, yes, I guess +you're right. I guess you got to have a streak of hardness in you to be +one of the biggest dancers in the world, or to be the biggest anything, +but"--here she ran across the room and was down on her knees beside his +chair--"I'm not hard any longer. Those jewels there," pointing to the +table behind her, "they don't mean a thing to me any longer, nor my +dancing, either, nor money, nor applause, nor anything in the world but +you." + +He shrank away from her as if he feared the subduing magnetism of her +touch. "The useless cog to drop away when you get tired of him! I told +you your life was all rounded and complete." + +"It's not," she cried passionately, "without love. Without your love. +I've got it and you can't take it away from me." + +He brushed the wing of hair back from his pallid face. "My love!" His +voice seemed to drip the bitterness of gall. "Where in heaven's name is +there any place for it?" + +"There isn't much room for anything else," she returned, "and that's the +truth. I've told you that all those things that you say make my life +complete, don't mean that," she snapped her long fingers, "not that to +me any more. I've told you that I'd give them all up for you if you +asked me, but," and here she swept to her feet, as if upborne by a rush +of earnestness so intense and deeply felt that it was in itself a +passion, "but I'll give 'em up, for it's a lot to give, for the man I +know you are and--and not for the man that's been shirking life." + +Since the first moments after she had begun to voice her experiences, +and what he called her merciless philosophy, he had crumpled down in his +chair, and when she had sprung up, he had risen perfunctorily and +wearily to his feet, but at her last words he had straightened up as if +involuntarily every muscle grew tense, an outward and visible indication +of his mental attitude. Inherited and traditional pride was in the +haughty and surprised uplift of his head; a bright flush had risen on +his cheek and his eyes sparkled with a thousand wounded and angry +reflections. + +Whether or not she had intended to produce this effect by her words, +she was undaunted by it, and went on: "José tells me that you got a big +place in England, just waiting for you to come and claim it, and you +quit it and everything there because a girl turned you down. It was sure +a baby act." + +"I--" he began to interrupt her. There were few men who would have cared +to ignore that chilled steel quality of Seagreave's voice or, for the +matter of that, the chilled steel look on his face. + +But there were certain emotions the Pearl had never known, and they +included remorse and fear. "I ain't finished yet," the gesture with +which she imposed his silence held her accustomed languor. "I got to say +that the man--that's you--that fought all through the Boer war was no +shirker, and the man who did some of the things you did in India--you +got some kind of a medal, didn't you?--what was it José called +you?--soldier of fortune--well, you weren't a quitter, anyway." + +She stretched out her arms to him and smiled, her compelling +heart-shattering smile. Ardor enveloped her like an aura; the beauty and +color of her were like fragrance on the air. "That's the kind of man I +want to marry, Harry, not a man that's willing to live outside of life +and work, and stay dead and buried here in these mountains." + +He did not bend to her by an inch. Her smiles and her ardor splintered +against chilled steel and fell unheeded. "Is there anything else?" he +asked, after a slight interval of silence, during which he had the +appearance of waiting with a pronounced and punctilious courtesy for +further words from her. + +She made no answer, merely continued to look at him, but he, apparently +unmindful and indifferent to that gaze, lifted his book from the table +beside him and, still standing, because she did so, began to read. + +For a moment or two she seemed dazed and then, with trembling fingers, +she gathered up her jewels and placed them in the little black bag. + +This task accomplished, she started with all the scornful grace, the +indifferent languor of a Spanish duchess to sweep from the room, but in +passing him and noting him still absorbed in his book, her hot blood +flushed her cheek, her eyes glittered with angry fire. Her slight pause +caused him to look up and, seeing the anger on her face, he smiled +amusedly, insufferably. The next second she sprang at him like a cat and +slapped him across his insolently smiling face, and then flung Spanish +oaths at him with such force and heat that they seemed to splutter in +falling upon the chill of the air. Then she flashed from the room. + +But the maddening smile still lingered on his lips as he bent to pick up +the book her blow had sent flying to the floor. And, still smiling, he +stood for a moment caressing the white dents her fingers had left on his +cheek. Finally he replenished the fire, filled and lighted his pipe and, +drawing his chair near to the hearth, sat, thinking, thinking, the +greater part of the night. + +Pearl was out early the next morning, and walked halfway down the hill. +When she returned to the cabin she found Seagreave sitting in his chair +by the hearth as if he had not moved during the night; his haggard gaze +was fixed on the dead ashes of the fire. Without speaking to him, Pearl +stooped down and, with some paper and bits of wood, began to build up a +blaze again. + +He peered at her a moment as if she were a vision, then got up very +stiffly as if he had not moved for hours, and began to assist her, +mechanically following the usual routine of preparing breakfast. + +When it was ready they sat down opposite each other as was their custom, +and made a pretense of eating. With the exception of a perfunctory +remark or so the meal passed in silence. Pearl evidently had no +intention of apologizing for her behavior of the night before. Her +manner toward him was that of one who had relegated him to the position +of the tables and chairs, and intended to take no more notice of him. + +Taking it for granted that that was the relation she wished sustained +between them, Seagreave gravely adopted her attitude, and for the next +few days if they spoke at all it was principally about the work that was +going on down at the crevasse. Never had Harry occupied himself so +constantly and so feverishly, for the most part outside the cabin, +chopping and sawing diligently at a huge pile of wood, and in his +intervals of leisure he spent a great deal of time down the hill by the +mountain of snow, watching its almost magical vanishing. + +"There is a great crowd down at the ravine to-night," he said to Pearl, +one evening at supper. "They are working with torches, and I think they +will probably have some kind of a bridge swung over by midnight. I +managed to signal to them a while ago, and they know that we are safe +now. If--if you want to sit up to-night," his voice sounded strained and +perfunctory, "I think you could possibly get over before morning." + +The shadow which had fallen upon her face in the last day or two +deepened a little. "It will be cold out there at night." She caught at +the first excuse which came into her mind. "It will be better to wait +and go down after breakfast." + +He acquiesced with a nod, but made no answer in words, and soon after he +left the room, and she, later, peeping cautiously out from the curtain +behind the window, saw him walking back and forth before the cabin. + +It was an hour or two later when he opened the door and entered. She did +not hear him. She was standing, her elbow on the mantel-piece and her +cheek on her hand, looking down into the fire. His footsteps roused her +from her reverie and she looked up, in that moment of surprise, +forgetful of self and therefore self-revealing. Thus she stood for one +fleeting second, holding him with her smile, her whole being seeming to +rush out and meet and encompass him and embrace him. Then her eyelashes +drooped long and black on her cheek, and her face was all aflame with +color. + +He stood still a second, breathing hard. Then from the shadow he hurled +himself into that zone of glowing firelight where she stood. A white +flame passed over his face and lighted his eyes with that burning, +incandescent glow that only those cold, blue eyes can show. Primeval, +all preliminary bowing and scraping in the minuet of wooing ignored, he +saw his heart's desire and seized it, lifting the Pearl in his arms, +crushing her against his breast, until she, dazed for the moment, lay +captured and captive. + +But her second of surprised, involuntary non-resistance served her well. +Harry looked into her eyes and forgot his vigilance; and with a twist +Pearl slipped through his arms and was across the room. She stood +against the wall of the cabin, her head thrown back, a smile on her +white lips, her eyes daring him. + +Seagreave took no dares. It was a part of his creed. He was across the +room in a step, his arms outstretched as if to clasp her. + +But Pearl held him with her eyes until at least she covered her face +with her hands and wept and leaned toward him, and again Seagreave +caught her in his arms with a murmur of passionate and inarticulate +words. "I love you, I love you," he whispered, his lips seeking hers. + +"Pearl, forgive me. I--I--forgot myself, forgive me. Why, you are as +safe here as in your father's cabin. It will never happen again. I'll +never touch you again unless you let me. Why, Pearl," with a tremulous +attempt at a joke, "for the rest of the time that we're here you can +keep me locked up in the other room if you want to, and just pass my +food through the door now and then when you feel like it." + +"Oh, Harry," she was still sobbing, "I'm such a devil. All my life I've +been trying to see what I could get. I set out to make everything and +everybody pay me, and I never got anything but chaff; money and jewels +and applause--all chaff. The only happiness is giving, and I want to +give, give, give to you. That's what I been longing to do ever since I +loved you, and all I could do was to call you names--a quitter and a +shirker." She wept afresh. "And the worst of it is I mean it, I wish I +didn't, but I do." + +"But you were right," he said, "good and right, too. You hurt my man's +vanity, and I got nasty--sarcastic, you know. I've got you to thank +forever for bringing myself right home to me--showing me to myself. I +was a morbid, love-sick boy, who indulged in so much self-pity that he +thought he was a very fine romantic figure, running off from his +responsibilities and burying himself in the ends of the earth." + +"I was jealous, too, of that girl you quit things for, that girl that +was like violets and white roses. I ain't like 'em." + +"Jealous! You! It wasn't long that I remembered her, but you were right +again--I liked that life. I'd got used to it. The other kind seemed +impossible to me--I've been a quitter and a shirker--just what you +called me--but I'm going back home to take it all up again, or if you +would rather, I'll stay here and work mines in these mountains, or help +reclaim the desert--if you'll marry me, Pearl." + +"But I'm the Black Pearl--a dancer. I don't see how I can begin to be +anything else now; but I will, I'll be anything you ask me, Harry," +throwing her arms about his neck, "I will." + +He laughed and held her closer still. "I'll never ask you to be anything +else. 'The Black Pearl--a dancer,' that's enough for me. You shall have +all the joy of your gift--its expression. I'm not such a selfish animal +as to ask you to give that up, so that I can keep you--you beautiful, +tropical bird--in a cage, just to gratify my sense of possession--and +watch you mope and pine, because I've kept you from your flights. No, +sweetheart, you shall dance, and have your big audiences that inspire +you, and the applause you love ... and then you'll come back to me, and +I'll be waiting for you and working--always working. I promise you that, +Pearl. But," fixing determined eyes on her, "I'll not dangle around +after you, and patch up your rows with your managers, and engage your +maids, nor be known as the Black Pearl's husband, by the Lord, no! I'll +do my own work in the world, and stand and fall by my own merit, if +there's any in me. But kiss me, Pearl, kiss me." + +"Then it's the last kiss till to-morrow," she smiled, "for it's past +midnight now." + +The morning dawned, a blare of sunlight. Pearl, glancing from the window +just before they ate their early breakfast, could see that bridge was in +place. Both she and Harry were quiet. It was the last meal together in +the cabin, and more than once tears filled her eyes and ran down her +cheeks as she made a pretense of eating. "They're happy tears, Harry, +honest, they are," she assured him. "I guess I'm kind of locoed at the +thought of seeing Pop and Bob and Hughie again. Come on, let's hurry +down now and meet them." She stood up and drained her coffee cup and +then threw her cape about her. "Come on." She held out her hand to him +and smiled. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The sun-flooded hillside showed plainly the path of the avalanche; +blank, featureless it lay, without sheltering tree or rock to diversify +its bald monotony. But it was bare no longer, for the brown earth was +covering her nakedness with a delicate mist of green. Beyond the sweep +of the avalanche the maples were swinging their tassels, and the +swelling buds of the oaks and aspens showed that they were almost ready +to burst into leaf; the air was full of bird calls and fluttering wings, +and the breeze, although chill, seemed ineffably soft in comparison with +its recent rigorous blasts. + +Pearl and Seagreave had gone but a short distance from the cabin when +suddenly Pearl shielded her eyes with her hand. "Look," she cried +excitedly, and pointed to two men who were standing down by the bridge +evidently awaiting them, "I can't quite see from here, but it is, it +must be, Bob and Pop." + +She almost flew down the hill after that, and Seagreave, his face +suddenly set in lines of determination, kept pace with her. He had +noticed, even if she had not, that those two motionless figures at the +bridge had not advanced one step to meet her, but were maintaining an +attitude portentously watchful, it seemed to him, and boding ill for the +warmth and spontaneity of the welcome she so evidently expected. + +But Pearl appeared to see nothing of this, and as she drew near the two +who awaited her, she would have flown like a bird into her father's +arms. But before she could throw her arms about him he caught her wrists +and pushed her back a step or two anything but gently. + +"Why weren't you down at the bridge last night?" he asked sternly. The +old man had changed since the avalanche. There were anxious deep hollows +about his eyes which were at once brighter and more sunken than ever. +His parchment skin looked livid and lifeless and his mouth had tightened +until it was drawn in and pinched. + +"Why weren't you down at the gully waiting for us?" he asked again. "The +bridge was across at midnight. The boys have been working night and day +to get you out, and this is the way you act, hiding up there in that +cabin like you'd as lief stay there as not." + +"Yes, Pearl, why weren't you down to meet us?" Bob Flick spoke for the +first time, his slow, soft voice was placating and yet it was evident +that his sympathies were with Gallito. "The boys had the place all lit +up with torches while they worked, and your Pop and I waited half the +night for you down here. Why didn't you come?" Neither of the men had so +far even glanced at Seagreave, but ignored him as thoroughly as if he +were not there. + +Pearl looked at Flick a moment in frowning incomprehension. Petted, +spoiled child that she was, she could not bear to be scolded where she +had expected a rapturous welcome. From Flick to her father she glanced, +and then back again. "What's the matter with you two?" she cried. "Are +you mad just because I didn't come chasing down the hill in the dead of +night? How did I know that the boys were going to get the bridge across +at midnight?" + +"Because, if you'd been the sort of girl you ought to be, you wouldn't +have stayed a minute longer in that cabin than you could have helped. +You'd have stood down by the gully all night long just to show the folks +in the camp that you wouldn't stay in that cabin after there was any +chance at all for you to get away," Gallito answered her before Bob +Flick got a chance. "What made you stay up there? You and him, too," he +pointed one, long, gnarled forefinger at Seagreave, "have got to answer +me that question. And there's another one, too, and you'll answer it." + +Again Pearl stared at him, and again she turned her puzzled eyes on Bob +Flick. Then, as the meaning of their attitude flashed over her, she fell +back a pace or two, her face grown white. "Dios!" she murmured, with +stiff lips, a sob rising in her throat. + +Then she tossed high her head in hot resentment. Her mouth was set in a +thin scarlet line of obstinacy, her eyes burned, but their expression +was unreadable. With a slow movement of her body, expressing infinite +scorn, she swung away from her father and her lover and, with her eyes +upon the far, blue ranges, superbly ignored them. + +Bob Flick shot a warning glance at Gallito, who was about to speak, and +took a hasty step forward. "Look here, Pearl," he said conciliatingly, +"don't mind your Pop. The strain on him's been awful. It's been hard on +all of us. You sure gave us some terrible days, not knowing whether you +were alive or dead, but we all kind of figured from the direction that +the snow-slide took that it missed the cabin, and we wouldn't believe +anything else but that you were as much alive as ever and as anxious to +see us as we were to see you. And, Pearl, listen," striving to divert +her gaze from those dim, blue ranges, "we ain't been idle. There's some +great news for you. You tell her, Gallito." + +"Yes," the Spaniard's tone softened a little and he lifted his head with +a touch of pride, "it sure is great news. I been in correspondence with +Sweeney and he opened up the matter of a contract again. I been +dickering with him just the same as if we knew that you were safe and +alive. I wouldn't let myself think anything else; and the result, +Pearl," he paused, his eyes scanning her face, "the result is that he's +just doubled his offer of last year and will play you over a circuit +twice as big, the cities only. How does that strike you?" + +But there was no answering enthusiasm on Pearl's face, not even a gleam +of interest. Gallito and Flick looked at each other in dismay. Her +indifference was genuine, they saw that clearly. There was no affected +disdain in her manner of receiving the news. It was simply a matter +which did not touch her at all. + +Seeing this, a slow, burning flush crept up into her father's face, his +jaws worked. "Pearl, did you hear?" he demanded, "because if you didn't, +you'd better pay attention, and pay attention quick. I've accepted for +you, given my word to Sweeney that if you were alive you'd take this +offer. And now you and me are going to leave Colina within a few hours, +and you're going to leave for good. Understand?" + +She smiled in slow, indifferent scorn and answered nothing, and her +attitude maddened Gallito. "What do you mean by acting this way?" he +cried. "Let's get down to it. Why weren't you down at the gully last +night? Wouldn't he let you?" Again he pointed an accusing finger at +Seagreave, who stood a little apart watching the scene with folded arms. +"Pearl, you answer me, for I'm going to ask you that question straight +out now. Ain't you just as good as when you came?" + +But Pearl's seven or seventeen devils were in full possession of her +now, and one of them, the demon of silence, stood her in good stead, for +she knew intuitively that this attitude of non-explanation would prove +far more irritating to her inquisitors than the vials of her wrath +poured freely upon them. + +But Gallito was in a white fury by this time. "By God!" he cried again, +"you will answer me. You will tell me, and tell me now." + +"I'll be hanged first," she flashed the words at him as a snake darts +its fangs. + +"And I'll be hanged if you'll ask her such questions before me," cried +Seagreave, speaking for the first time. + +Her father looked at him with a slow and bitter smile, then he gave a +little nod of acrid comprehension. "You keep out of this, Harry +Seagreave," he said, in a low, cold, deadly voice. "This is between the +girl and me. Pearl, you come with me--now. We leave Colina, as I told +you, within a few hours. You come now." He took a step or two down the +hill as if expecting that she would follow him. + +A wailing wind blew down from the peaks. The mocking bark of a coyote +sounded near at hand in those wild solitudes, a bird flew from one tree +to another, and the sound of a breaking twig was like a pistol shot. + +Moments passed and still Pearl had not obeyed her father's command. It +was not repeated, which was characteristic of Gallito. He merely waited +until at last she lifted her eyes and unwaveringly met his. "I'm not +going," she said clearly. + +Harry made a quick, impetuous step toward her, but before he could reach +her, her father had caught her by the wrist again and swept her aside. + +"Look here, Gallito," cried Seagreave, "since she won't explain, you've +got to listen to me. I--" + +"I've told you to keep out of this, Seagreave," interrupted Gallito, in +his harsh, grating voice. "I'll deal with you later." + +But at the sound of Seagreave's voice the color had come back to Pearl's +cheek, the light to her eyes. Hands on hips, she swung her skirts and +surveyed Bob Flick and her father with a scornful, slanting gaze. "I +didn't know that there was anybody in the world that would dare ask me +such questions, even you, Pop. And making arrangements with Sweeney +without waiting to consult me! And ordering me to leave Colina on two +or three hours' notice! Dios!" She spread her hands out on either side +of her as if pushing away an impossible thing. "I can hardly believe it. +I didn't answer you, Pop, nor you, Bob, because I was trying hard to +take things in. But now," she turned to Seagreave, her head lifted +higher yet in the glory of joy and pride, "I'm not going to leave +Colina--yet, and I'm not going to sign up with Sweeney; am I, Harry?" + +Seagreave passed her father and was beside her in two strides. "You're +going to do as you please," he said. + +She leaned toward him, smiling, her fugitively sweet, tantalizing smile; +and, oblivious of the others, Seagreave caught her to him as if he would +hold her against the world. + +And, seeing this, Bob Flick turned and walked down the hill with never a +backward glance. + +Not so Gallito; his eyes had darkened, those fierce hawk's eyes; his +face was livid. "Pearl," his voice grated in his throat, "you can't make +a fool of both me and yourself like this. You are a fool of a woman like +all the rest, and because I have the bad luck to be your father I must +save you from your own madness. You've got your big chance, the chance +you've been waiting for, and you're not going to throw it away now, just +because you been staying up in that cabin alone with him until you've +lost your wits about him." He indicated Seagreave with a contemptuous +jerk of the thumb. + +"Seagreave," in cold fury, "you're a damned thief to take advantage of +her this way. Now, Pearl, you come on." + +He seized her by the wrist and would have drawn her roughly from Harry's +encircling arm. She resisted, and Harry, in the strength of his +indignation, unloosed the old man's grasp and drew her hastily away. But +the touch of his hands had roused in Gallito fresh rage, and with almost +unbelievable quickness he lifted his heavy, gnarled stick and swung it +above Seagreave's head. Harry leaped back, near, perilously near, the +edge of the ravine. The soft, moist earth crumbled beneath his feet; for +a second he tottered on the edge, and then went down like a shot. + +Pearl stood arrested in that first, quick rush of hers, frozen, gazing +in wild unbelief at the spot where Harry had disappeared. As for +Gallito, he also gazed almost uncomprehendingly, until the expression of +surprise on his livid face gave way to a saturnine and vindictive +satisfaction. + +"He did it himself," he muttered, "the fool! I never touched him." Then, +shrugging his shoulders and spreading out his hands as if well content +to leave the matter to fate, he turned and began to walk down the hill, +still muttering as he went. + +This roused Pearl from her momentary trance. "Father," she cried wildly, +"you must help me. You tried to hurt him and now you've got to help me. +We must get him. Father, father," she babbled, running after him, "you +must stay, you must help me, you must. You can't go and leave him. Oh, +stay, stay, and I'll do anything, anything in the world. I'll sign the +contract. I'll do anything." + +But Gallito went on as if he did not hear her. His own belief was that +Harry was done for. There was not one chance in a thousand that he was +alive, one chance in a million, considering the depth of the ravine. +Well, better so. His conscience was clear. He had not struck him, but +had merely lifted his stick in self-defense after Seagreave had laid +hands on him. As for Pearl, she would eventually turn to him and agree +to his wishes, there was nothing else for her to do. In the meantime, by +leaving her to herself, he avoided the unpleasant sound and sight of her +grief and reproaches. Therefore, in spite of her passionate pleading, he +went on. + +And Pearl, finally realizing that she could hope nothing from him, +turned and ran back to the ravine. There she threw herself flat on the +ground and, groaning and sobbing, drew herself to the edge of the cliff +and gazed down into those depths of purple shadow. Much of the snow +still lingered, and for a moment in the white, dazzling glare of the +sunlight on the steep walls, she could see nothing. Then, as her eye +became accustomed to those flashing refractions of light, she gave a +loud, sobbing cry, her whole body became strangely limp and inert. For +one dreadful moment she feared that she was going to faint. Then she +drew on all the strength of her will and was herself again, ready in +that moment of poignant relief to dare anything, do anything to save +him. + +For quite plainly she saw Harry. Instead of whirling down into those +impenetrable depths and being buried in the mass of snow at the bottom, +he had been caught almost miraculously on the out-curving trunks of two +or three young pine trees growing close together and springing from a +narrow out-cropping ledge of rock. It was not so very far down, at most +not more than thirty feet. "Harry," she cried, "Harry," sending her +voice ringing down the chasm; but he did not even stir at the sound, +only the narrow walls gave back the echoes. The silence struck the chill +of a new terror to her heart, and she sprang to her feet, gazing wildly +about her in every direction. + +"I must have help. I must have help," she muttered. But, oh, it would +take so long to get men from the camp, and all the time she would be +gone he would be lying there silent and motionless, perhaps--no, she +shuddered, she would not even think the word. + +Once more she sent her seeking, despairing gaze over the hillside, and +then uttered a sharp, muffled exclamation, for, rising above the jagged +walls of the ravine, and not many feet away, climbing, agilely and +rapidly, she saw a man. A moment more and she bent forward in a state +half of relief and half of superstitious terror, muttering a prayer, +almost believing that it was a vision; and then, with a relief beyond +all speech, she saw that it was José. She could not be mistaken. + +He had pulled himself over the cliff by this time and had cautiously +risen to his feet. Up and down the hill and in every direction he sent +his sweeping, careful gaze, his far-sighted eyes taking in every detail +of the landscape. Then he came toward Pearl, over the bare, brown +earth, running low. + +"Oh, José, José," she cried, almost hysterical in her relief, "Harry is +down there," pointing to the cliff, "hurt, and you must help me get him +up, you must." + +"Carramba! So that was the noise and screaming I heard in my rock cell +yonder, just as I was about to creep out and take a little air. I would +not have dared to come so far if I had not seen you here alone." He +threw himself on the ground and looked over the cliff. "Saints and +devils! It is true. Poor Harry! But you and I cannot get him up alone." + +"But we can, we must," she cried imperatively. "Go to his cabin quickly +and bring some ropes. There is plenty of strong rope there. You can run +more quickly than I. Go." + +"But the risk." José shook his head dubiously. "I shall be in full sight +all the way." + +"What of it?" she cried frantically. "The moments pass and we are doing +nothing. No one will see you. Oh, go." Then, as he still hesitated, a +sudden thought struck her. She tore open the neck of her gown and drew +out the little black leather bag of loose stones. "Look!" she pulled it +open and held it out to him that he might see the gleaming jewels +inside. "There, will that make it worth your while? They are yours, +José, if you will only go." + +With a low exclamation of surprise and admiration, José bent over them. +Then he looked at Pearl, his eyes alive with darting gleams of avarice. +He would have risked his life any time, almost without a thought, in +order to gain them, and here without his even lifting a finger, they had +fallen into his hands, straight out of heaven. It was evidently a reward +for the patience with which he had borne the long days that he had lain +hidden in Gallito's rock-hewn chamber in the Mont d'Or. + +"It shall never be said of Crop-eared José that he left a friend in +distress," he exclaimed virtuously, and, stuffing the little bag in his +pocket, sped up the hill. + +Uttering broken expressions of relief, Pearl again threw herself flat on +the ground and gazed over the edge of the cliff. And, as she lay thus, +moaning out passionately tender words which Harry, lying motionless and +unconscious, could not hear, a sudden thought struck her. She would go +to him. She looked down, far down where those rocky walls lost +themselves in indefinite hazes and shuddered; but another glance at +Harry and courage flowed to her again. She saw where, on the narrow +projecting ledge and on the trunks of those up-springing pines, she +could get a foothold near him, if it were but possible for her to climb +down. Scanning the wall closely, it seemed to her rough and jagged +enough for her to do so with comparative safety. + +Just as she reached this decision, she heard a faint holloo from the +same direction in which José had come and, turning her head quickly, she +saw Mrs. Nitschkan hastening over the hill toward her. + +"Gosh a'mighty!" exclaimed the gypsy, when she had come within speaking +distance. "What kind of a howdy-do is this? I brought up a bite for José +to eat and, although I've stood down there whistling my head off, he +never poked his head out of the ground, the jack-rabbit! And the next +thing I see is you lying flat in the mud." + +"Oh, Nitschkan!" Tears of relief were streaming down Pearl's face. +"Thank God that you've come. Harry fell over the cliff. We can see him, +and José's gone to the cabin to get ropes." + +With many exclamations of surprise Mrs. Nitschkan peered over the edge +of the ravine. "Saved by them little sticks of pine trees and a piece of +rock no wider than my foot! Ain't that the workings of Providence for +you!" + +"Is he--is he--do you think he is--" Pearl's voice broke in anguish. + +"No, I don't. He ain't lookin' that way," said Mrs. Nitschkan, with such +force and heartiness that Pearl was immediately reassured. "He's jus' +got the sense knocked out of him. I don't jus' see yet how we're goin' +to get the ropes fastened to him, so's he can be drug up." + +"I'm going down to him. I'll fasten them." + +"You! And yet I don't know but what it ain't best. It'll take all the +strength José and I've got to draw him up careful and not go bumping him +too much against the rocks." + +Pearl took off her shoes, then, shutting her lips tightly and reassuring +herself with the knowledge that the rock was rough and she was +sure-footed, she lowered herself over the side of the ravine and +reached for a foothold. Presently she found it, and then another. +Slowly, with cut and bleeding hands, she made her way down. Half way, +perhaps, she grasped a little bush which seemed to spring securely from +the cliff and held tightly to this until she could grasp another jutting +point of rock and then another bush, until at last, with a great sobbing +sigh, she found her feet planted on what seemed sure ground. It was the +trunks and the outspreading branches of the same pine trees which held +Seagreave. She took a second to draw a long breath, and then, holding +cautiously to a little branch, she bent over him. + +With infinite tenderness she attempted to straighten out one leg which +was doubled beneath him, but he moaned and sighed so that she desisted, +seeing from the limp way that it lay that it was broken. He had +evidently fallen on his back; and like a dagger zig-zagging its way +through her heart was the thought, "What if that, too, were broken?" + +Oh, how should they get him up without injuring him further and cruelly +hurting him with the ropes. And he must be so cold. She shivered herself +in the damp, icy air of this ravine. She called up to Mrs. Nitschkan to +swing down to her her long cape, which she had discarded before +beginning her climb. The gypsy did so carefully, but just as she let the +end of it go a gust of wind swept it in slow circles down the ravine. + +Mrs. Nitschkan uttered more or less profane exclamations of disgust; but +Pearl said nothing. After her first feeling of intense disappointment, +a new idea had come to her, and she hastened to act upon +it. As quickly as she could with her torn fingers she unfastened her +gown and slipped out of it, and then, unheeding Mrs. Nitschkan, who was +scolding her like a magpie, she threw it over Seagreave, tucking it +about him as best she could. The breath of the snow-damp air upon her +shoulders and arms was like a bath of ice water, but she scarcely +noticed it, for she heard Mrs. Nitschkan welcoming José. + +[Illustration: "Holding cautiously to a little branch, she bent over +him."] + +He and the gypsy immediately began swinging great coils of rope over the +cliff. + +"Can you get the ropes under him, Pearl, and tie 'em in a kind of +cradle?" called Mrs. Nitschkan. + +"Of course," she answered, "if you and José will tell me how." + +Then, under their direction, she managed to bind the ropes securely +about Seagreave, moaning and weeping herself at the pain she evidently +caused him, although he did not so far recover consciousness as to +realize what was happening to him. When she had finished, she caught +another swinging end of rope which they threw her and climbed up the +cliff. She took a moment or two to get her breath, and then slowly and +with all the care possible under the circumstances, they drew Seagreave +up. + +"Dios!" cried José, panting, "it is well that you two are so strong, +because we have yet to get him to the cabin. Fortunately I, also, have +great strength." + +After some discussion it was finally decided that Pearl was to hasten on +ahead and build up the fires and heat water, while Mrs. Nitschkan and +José carried Harry up the hill. + +It was for them a slow and difficult progress, but the cabin was finally +reached and the gypsy and José laid him on his bed, undressed him and +examined his injuries. + +Presently Mrs. Nitschkan came into the outer room, where Pearl cowered +beside the fire, her hands over her face. She caught imploringly at the +other woman's skirt. "Oh, Nitschkan, what is it? Will he live? Tell me, +tell me, quick." + +"Things might be better and they might be worse, but," with rough good +will, "you ain't no call to wear mourning yet. His back ain't hurt +serious, but his left leg and his right arm are both broken and he's an +awful lot cut and bruised, especially about the back and the head. I can +set a leg myself, as good as most, and many a one have I done, but those +that I've set 'em for don't always seem to have as good use of their +limbs after as before. So if you want him as good as new again, you'd +better have a doctor." + +"Yes," agreed José, who had come into the room. "They are bad breaks. I, +too, can set a leg or an arm, but, as you say, Nitschkan, those for whom +I have done it have usually been ungrateful enough not to use them +right." + +Pearl staggered to her feet. "I will go," she said, "if you two will +only stay here and look after him, while I am gone. Oh dear José, +promise me that you will not leave Nitschkan alone. You can hide here +in the cabin when you see me coming with the doctor." + +José's fingers touched the little black bag in his pocket. "Saints and +devils!" he cried, expanding his chest, "only a dog would refuse you. Of +course I will stay." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +For the first few weeks after Harry's accident Pearl's consciousness of +the external events in the world beyond the confines of the four walls +of the cabin seemed obliterated. She could never remember afterward +whether the rain fell or the days were flooded with sunshine. All of her +energies and interests were absorbed in one issue--his recovery. +Fortunately, his injuries proved more painful than dangerous, and were +necessarily slow in the mending; but the nursing was arduous, and Pearl +might have found it difficult indeed had it not been for the assistance +of the two mountain women and José. + +It would be another matter to define correctly the motives that impelled +that debonair bandit to stand by her side so manfully in the face of +Gallito's wrath and reiterated prohibitions. It might have been a +conscientious wish to earn the jewels, over the possession of which he +had not ceased to gloat, or it might have been an impish desire to annoy +Gallito. Again, it might have been gratitude toward Seagreave, sympathy +with the Pearl, or, as easily the revolt of José's volatile nature +against the monotony of life in the narrow confines of his rock chamber. + +But to José's danger, as to the passing days, Pearl was alike oblivious, +and it was not until Harry was able to sit up again for brief periods, +that she became aware of times and seasons, of other persons and of the +world of human interests and reactions. She awoke to a realization of +these facts with a sort of wonder. She looked abroad over the hillsides +and saw a new world. The long-awaited spring had sped up from the +valleys of mist, and at the wave of her white wand the mountains had +bloomed with a delicate iridescence--the luster on young leaves and +shining blades of grass. It was then that she also began to apprehend +something of the nature of José's difficulties. + +"I must be more virtuous than I thought," he explained to her one day, +not without a touch of complacence, "for if the Devil were truly my +friend, he would fly away with your father. Those hawk's eyes of his are +ever on me and he orders me daily not to leave the mine. If I could but +cook for him," he added mournfully, "he would soon see reason, for," +with customary boastfulness, "I have yet to see the man whose opinions I +could not change with a single dish. I, Crop-eared José, have won +freedom more than once on an omelette, and have gained the sympathy and +interest of those set against me, with a single sauce. See, he even +threatens me because I am true to my friends, but," and here he adopted +his most wheedling tone, "if you only would make up with him, and I +could but cook him one supper, here in this cabin, and let him win two +or three games at cards from me, all would be well again." + +"Ah, if I only could," sighed Pearl, "but he wouldn't listen to me +unless I consented to leave Harry and sign with Sweeney. You know how +set he is, when he makes his mind up. No, he won't listen to me unless I +give in about this contract." + +José nodded without speaking. For once he appeared to be turning +something over in his mind. In truth, he was; he felt now that his +comfort and safety very largely depended upon a reconciliation between +Pearl and her father, and he was prepared to take long chances in an +attempt to effect this. Therefore he informed Gallito that from certain +remarks Pearl had made from time to time, he, José, was convinced that +her heart was greatly softened toward her father, and that for his part +he was also convinced that she desired nothing more than to see Gallito +again. + +The old Spaniard knew José too well to put much faith in any of his +utterances, but, nevertheless, inspired by a vague hope that Pearl might +have repented her decision and wearied of her bargain, he climbed the +hill to Seagreave's cabin the next afternoon to see her. + +Harry had been sitting up longer than usual that day, and José and Pearl +had helped him back to his couch in the inner room, where he now lay +asleep, and Pearl had resumed her seat in the open door, where she sat +gazing out at the wonderful panorama spread before her and idly enjoying +the sight, the sound, the fragrance of early summer. Blue ranges, an +infinite succession of them, stretching away to an illimitable and +expanding horizon, floating in faint pearl hazes, but the hills near at +hand were vividly green, their varied monotony of tone broken here and +there by great waves of pink and blue wild flowers. Birds were flying +from tree to tree, calling and singing, and there fell pleasantly upon +Pearl's ears the ripple and splash of the mountain brook. The joy in her +heart at Harry's recovery mingled pleasantly with nature's joy in her +prodigal, flowering summer. + +But all this harmonious blending of natural sounds and sights was broken +by the sudden, harsh intrusion of human discord. Hearing footsteps near +at hand, Pearl turned quickly to see her father standing almost at her +elbow. Lean, gnarled, grizzled and thorny as ever, he was gazing +searchingly at her from under his overhanging, bushy brows. + +So unexpected was the sight of him that Pearl showed plainly her +uncontrollable surprise, which, courageous as she was, was not without a +faint touch of fear. Her upper lip drew back from her teeth at the +corners of the mouth and the frown so like his own darkened her brow. +Rising, she had sprung to the doorway, stretching her arms from post to +post as if to prevent him from entering, and he, noting that unconscious +attitude of protection for the one within, smiled sourly. + +"What are you doing here?" Her voice was harsh and so low that it was +barely audible. + +"No harm to you or him, either, so don't be scared. I got more important +business in hand. I didn't come to quarrel with you, Pearl. I came to +talk to you like you were a sensible girl." He had been rolling a +cigarette between his fingers, and now he lighted it, and for a moment +watched the smoke wreaths drift upward. + +"Patience takes most of the tricks in life, I've learned, so I waited +until I heard that he was all right again"--he jerked his thumb toward +the cabin--"and then I waited until you had time to think, and that's +all I'm here to ask you to do, my girl, think." + +Again he gazed deeply at her, nodding his head as if to emphasize his +words. Gallito could be impressive, even magnetic when he chose, and he +chose now. + +"I can think a-plenty," returned Pearl curtly, "but what is it you want +me to study about now? If it's about signing up with Sweeney, I can tell +you once and forever that it's no use. You're just wasting your breath." + +His face darkened a little, his eyes gave one quick, wicked flash, but +he controlled his temper. "Maybe, maybe," he said placatingly, "but that +ain't all I came to talk about. I guess I've lived long enough to know +that it's no use to talk to a woman about her interests when she's lost +her head about some man." He showed his teeth in a wolfish and +contemptuous smile. "No, I ain't such a fool as to waste my breath that +way. You are an awful headstrong and wilful girl. Carraja! I do not know +where you get such qualities. But somewhere back in your head you have +inherited from me, your father, a grain of sense and reason, and because +of that I come here to-day, not to try and coax you, no, I know better +than that, but to talk to you as man to man." He paused here as if to +let some underlying meaning in his words impress her, and she, conscious +of this, felt a sudden shiver of apprehension run over her, a momentary +despair, as if she were being entangled in some yet invisible net whose +meshes were being drawn tight about her. A quick glance at Gallito +failed to restore her confidence. There was a look upon his face which +did not betoken any expectation of defeat. Again she shivered; he had +spoken truly, he was not one to plead, and he would not be here unless +he felt that he was in possession of certain arguments which must +inevitably coerce her to yield. + +"Now, Pearl," his tone was still placating, "for your own sake and for +the sake of your future, I am not willing that you should miss this +great offer which Sweeney has made you. You have already treated him +badly once. He knows he cannot depend on you. How many times do you +think he will stand that? You can't afford to do it. I have been holding +him off and holding him off until I can't do it any more, and we must +now come to a final agreement. And one thing more," he stopped a second +to light another cigarette, "what about Hughie? You and he have worked +out a lot of dances together. He's got his heart set on traveling with +you and playing for you. I don't see how you got the heart to spoil all +his plans." For the first time there was a touch of real emotion in his +voice; it was Hughie, not Pearl, who held the first place in his heart. + +A quiver passed over Pearl's face. "Oh, I am sorry about Hughie," she +cried, "but what can I do? I can't leave Harry. It's no use asking me to +do that." She looked up at Gallito and, in spite of her tears, there was +an immovable resolve on her face and, seeing this, a slow, dark flush +crept up her father's cheeks. + +"Listen, Pearl," he said, and although he still held the manner of +reasoning amicably with her, there was a touch of iron in his grating +voice, "I'm here to make terms with you and to keep the relations which +should be between father and daughter, but there are many things to +consider when a girl is as obstinate as a pig. Then it is her father's +duty to decide for her and to see that she does what an obedient and +well-brought up girl should do, and he must use what means are in his +power to make her see the right way." + +"There are no means in your power to make me see things differently," +she said, "yours or anybody else's." + +"So!" he said slowly, and flicked the ashes from his cigarette with a +hand which trembled slightly. "But all my cards are not played yet. You +think that everything shall go your way, but that is not life; no, that +is not life. Since you have none of the feelings of respect and +obedience which a child should have for a parent, it shall be a game +between us. Now, at once, I will play my trump card." There was a grim +and saturnine triumph in his voice. "José!" + +She started and looked at him askance, puzzled and yet fearful. "José!" +she repeated uncertainly. + +"Yes, José. José has been useful to you, and José has spent all his time +with you and him." He nodded his head in the direction of the inner +room. "I have warned him." There was a quiver of passion and resentment +in his voice. "I have pointed out to him again and again the risks that +he was running not only for himself, but me. Yet for me--me who has +befriended him at the risk of my own life, who has kept him in my cabin +for many months, he has no thought, no gratitude. That all goes to +Seagreave, Seagreave who stole you and who now lies strapped in his bed +unable to help you or José or any one else. Well, let Seagreave save him +now. And how?" his harsh, mirthless laughter rang out. "Yes, how? Does +Seagreave know the secret trails over the mountains? Not he. Then how is +our dear José to escape? Will you engage to get him safely out of Colina +on a railroad train? I think not. Remember there is a big price on his +head." + +Pearl had shrunk back from him while he was speaking, both horror and +fright on her face. "But you can't do that for your own sake," she +cried. "It will then be known that you have kept José all these months, +and that it was he who escaped the night I danced. Do you think the +sheriff will forgive you that you lied to him and fooled him? I guess +not. And then you sheltered José and hid him after that. On your own +account you can't let him be taken." + +Gallito smiled in unpleasant triumph. "If I should turn state's evidence +for so notorious a criminal as Crop-eared José I should certainly get +immunity myself. I was weak, yes, in my unfortunate desire to reform a +fellow countryman, but finding all my efforts hopeless, I at last saw my +duty and gave him up." + +For the moment fear almost overcame Pearl, and then her high spirit +flared. "And you would give poor José up," she said. "I would never have +believed it, and yet I see you really would do it, just to have me obey +your will. But you can't do it, and you won't do it. I tell you now, if +you even dare threaten such a thing, I will send for the sheriff and I +will tell him the whole story. I will let him know what you are. And +more, too"--she made quick steps toward him--"I will have you arrested +for assaulting Harry." + +"Ho, ho!" he laughed loudly. "Self-defense, my girl, self-defense. Who +could prove anything else? Who would take your word under the +circumstances?" + +"But I will tell more, much more," she cried, all aflame now. "I will +tell of all the cut-throats and thieves you have sheltered in your cabin +from time to time. I know their names and I will prove what I say. I +will show them the chamber in the mine where José is hiding. What will +they think of that? You have a high standing in Colina and in other +places. You are respected. Are you willing to give all that up just so +you can force me to sign with Sweeney? I don't believe it, I won't +believe it. But as sure as you don't help José to escape, so sure will I +do what I say. Oh," she stopped suddenly, a sob in her voice, "oh, here +comes Bob, Bob and Hughie!" For the first time she left the doorway in +which she had remained protectingly, and ran forward to meet the two who +were rapidly mounting the hill. + +"Oh, Bob!" she cried. "Oh, Hughie! I knew you two wouldn't go back on +me. I knew you'd come sooner or later, both of you." + +Hughie clung to her, one arm around her, and Flick's hard and impassive +face softened a little as he gazed at her. "Why, Pearl, what's the +matter?" he asked. "You look pale, and tears! Why, that ain't a mite +like you! Has he been cutting up rough," he glanced toward her father, +"and worrying you?" + +"Why didn't you come before?" She lifted her shadowed eyes to his. + +He winced a little, his mouth twisting slightly. "Ain't it enough that +I've come now?" Something in his voice conveyed even to her who had so +long taken his unwearying devotion without question and as a matter of +course what it had cost him to seek her again. + +They had drawn near the cabin by this time and Flick looked at Gallito's +frowning face a moment. "Are you needing me, Pearl?" His drawling voice +was as lazily indifferent as ever, but his glance held an intimation of +danger for Gallito which the old man did not fail to understand. + +"Maybe," Pearl replied in a low voice. "You 'most always come when I +need you, Bob." + +"I guess your interference ain't needed now, Flick," began Gallito. "I +can--" + +Hughie ran his hand caressingly down the old Spaniard's sleeve. "No need +to tell old Bob that we're a united family, Pop," he cried. "Why I'm +already composing a wedding march." He caught his adopted father's hand +in his. + +At this mute expression of affection from the being who was nearest his +heart Gallito's face softened a little, although he gazed back at Bob +Flick with a baffled and still scornful smile. + +"Well," he said reluctantly, "it ain't often I confess I'm beat, but I +guess I'm too old to stand both Hughie and the girl taking sides against +me, not to speak of you, Flick, and I know if it came to a choice +between me and those two where you'd stand." + +"There ain't going to be any sides taken," said Flick. "We are going to +give in and take what's coming to us, Gallito, like sensible men, +whether we like it or not. When's the wedding, Pearl?" + +A great, beautiful wave of crimson swept over her face. + +"Harry wants it right away," she said. + +"The sooner the better," remarked Bob Flick dryly. "And, by the way"--he +put his hand in his pocket and drew out the little black leather bag she +had given José--"José sent you back this for a wedding present. Honest, +he didn't keep out more than three stones. Why," a flash of alarm on his +face, "what's the matter, Hughie?" + +The blind boy was standing a little apart from the rest. His head was +thrown up and his face was pale. He was nervously clinching and +unclinching his hands, but with that exception his attitude was one of +tenseness and singular stillness, as if every faculty were concentrated. + +"There's something about," he gasped, "something bad. I can't tell what +it is yet, but I'll know in a minute. Ah-hh!" He rushed across the open +space before the cabin and into the trees that grew thickly at the side. + +It took Flick but a second to follow him, and the next moment Pearl and +her father heard him call. "Come out. I got you covered, but I'll thank +you first for your gun." + +Gallito also started forward now, but before he had taken more than a +step or two Hugh emerged first from the underbrush, followed by Hanson +and then by Flick. + +Seeing who it was, Pearl had shrunk back into the shadow of the room, +but then, as if forcing herself to an unpleasant task, she came forward +again and leaned against the door post, nonchalant and disdainful in +spite of her pallor and the faint trembling of her lower lip. + +Hanson swept off his hat and bowed low with exaggerated courtesy and +much of his old swagger. The heavy dissipation of the last few months +was evident in a marked and shocking way. His figure was gross and +bloated, and his bold, ruddy good looks had vanished; his swollen face +was purple and the features seemed curiously thickened. The hand which +held his hat trembled constantly. + +"Again we meet," he cried. "Well, under the circumstances, I've no +objection. You pleasant little band of thieves have got ahead of the +honest man once or twice, but not for keeps. This is my day, thank you. +I'm not giving away information ahead of time again, but, just between +friends, I'll mention that the sheriff is overdue at Nitschkan's cabin, +where José happens to be. They'll be up after the rest of you +presently." + +"Carraja!" Gallito ground his teeth, "and I left him at the mine." Then +quickly to Pearl, "Suppose he should get away from them. Are both +horses in the stable?" + +"Both," she said. "Hurry, you get on one and I will have the other ready +for him. Come, I will help you. Hugh, get down to Nitschkan's and warn +them if you can." + +Gallito ran through the cabin after her. This commotion roused Seagreave +and after calling once or twice to Pearl and receiving no answer, he +made his way to the doorway, appearing there, thin and white, still upon +crutches. + +"Hello, Seagreave," called Hanson, still with his air of bravado. +"You've been a long time coming to that door. I been sitting back in the +bushes watching for you as patient as a cat watches a mouse-hole, with +my gun all cocked and my finger on the trigger, ready to pick you off +the minute you showed up. Nothing against you personally, but the Black +Pearl didn't spare me, so why should I--oh, you needn't reach for your +gun. Good old Bob, ain't that what the Pearl calls him, has got me +covered." + +"So have I for that matter," said Seagreave. + +"All right, if it amuses you." Hanson shrugged his shoulders +indifferently and leaned up against a tree which, growing before the +cabin, had escaped the sweep of the avalanche. "Lord! Don't I know what +you two cut-throats stand ready to do to me? And no one any the wiser. +Well, what the hell do I care? But say, Seagreave, since we're all +having this nice little afternoon tea talk together, sociable as a +Sunday school, it might do you good to take some account of the +has-beens. Here's Bob, he had her before I did, but that ain't taking +away the fact that I had her once, by God! I guess everybody understands +that there's more behind those emeralds than the pretty story we've all +heard so often. The Black Pearl certainly ain't cheap." + +"Let him alone, Harry." Bob Flick's voice arresting Seagreave in his +swift rush toward Hanson had never been more liquid, more languid. All +through Hanson's speech his face had not shown even a flicker of +expression. "This is mine. It always has been mine, and I've known it +ever since you and me, Mr.----, I never can recall your name, but, then, +yellow dogs ain't entitled to 'em, anyway--met in the desert." + +"I guess that's straight. You always had it in for me from the first +night I saw her. Well, you'll only be finishing what she begun. She +broke me; she drove me straight to hell. Maybe it was a mis-spent life I +offered her, but when I met her I had money and success, I wasn't a +soak. I still had the don't-give-a-damn snap in me, and, even if you're +middle-aged, that's youth. But she's like a fever that you can't shake +off. And she don't play fair. But she's the only one. You know that, Bob +Flick, and she didn't have the right--" + +"I ain't ever questioned her right, Hanson"--Flick used his name for the +first time--"and I'm standing here to prove it now. For the sake of Miss +Gallito, because she once took notice of you, I'm going to treat you +like you was a gentleman. Here's your gun. Take your twenty paces. And, +remember, this ain't to wound, it's to kill." + +Hanson took the pistol and measured off the paces. Then he turned and +looked from one man to another with a smile of triumph on his evil face. +"Broke by the Black Pearl and then shot by her dog! That's a nice +finish. I can shoot some myself, but I ain't in your class, Flick, and +you know it. I guess not. I prefer my own route." He looked toward the +cabin, where it seemed to him that Pearl or her shadow wavered a moment +in the doorway. "Here's dying to you, honey," and before either man +could stop him he lifted his pistol and shot himself through the heart. + + * * * * * + +In the meantime certain events of more importance than the passing of +Hanson, to those involved, were taking place in Mrs. Nitschkan's cabin. +As soon as Gallito had left the mine and taken his way up to Seagreave's +José also had departed from his cell by way of the ravine and had +hastened to the abode of Mrs. Nitschkan, where he and Mrs. Thomas were +soon absorbed in the composition of various appetizing dishes, for with +the connivance of the two women José hoped that evening again to +subjugate Gallito with the spell of his cookery, and win back the +indulgence he had been steadily losing. + +The afternoon, then, was passing most pleasantly for both Mrs. Thomas +and himself when suddenly the door was flung open and Mrs. Nitschkan, +who had been fishing in a creek further down the hill, came dashing in. + +"José," she cried, "the Sheriff and his boys is all out after you again. +There's nobody else they'd want up this way. They couldn't keep under +cover all the way, for they had to cross the bridge, and I happened to +see 'em then. Get out quick through the trees for Harry's cabin." + +"But I don't know the secret trail." + +"Gallito does. Anyway, cut for it an' maybe I can throw them off the +scent. Gosh a'mighty! Cut for it. They're here." + +With one last, hasty kiss on Mrs. Thomas' cheek, José was out of the +door like a flash. + +"Now quick, Marthy." Mrs. Nitschkan had seized a pair of scissors and +cut the pocket from her skirt, tucking the roll of bills which it +contained into her man's boot. "Cry, Marthy, cry like you never cried +before. Go on, I say. Yelpin's your strong suit. Now yelp." + +With that she fell to swearing lustily herself and throwing the +furniture about, even turning the stove over and sending a great shower +of soot about the room. + +At the height of all this noise and confusion, dominated, it must be +said, by Mrs. Thomas's loud and, to do her justice, sincere weeping, +there came a thunderous knocking on the door, and without waiting to +have it answered the sheriff threw it open and stepped in. + +"Holy smoke!" he cried. "What you knockin' down the cook-stove for?" + +"'Cause I'm fightin' mad, that's why," returned Mrs. Nitschkan tartly, +"and I sure am glad to see you. I been robbed, that's what. Ain't that +so, Marthy?" + +Mrs. Thomas lifted her tear-stained face and corroborated this with +mournful nods. + +"Whilst I was takin' a little nap," went on Mrs. Nitschkan excitedly, "a +rascal brother of Gallito's who shouldn't never have been let out of +jail cut the pocket clean out of my skirt and stole my roll. Look here!" +exhibiting the jagged hole, and also the empty pocket which lay upon the +floor, "I just waked up to find him gone. He can't have got far, though. +I guess he thinks I ain't on to that rock chamber Gallito blasted out +for him in the Mont d'Or, but he showed it to Marthy here, and she +showed it to me. Come on, and we'll get down there quick." + +"Some of us will." The sheriff was inclined to believe her, and yet he +was still suspicious. A rock chamber in the Mont d'Or! That certainly +accounted for the miraculous escape of last winter. + +"Pedro?" he asked. "Are you sure it ain't José?" + +"I ain't heard of any José, have you Marthy?" asked Mrs. Nitschkan +innocently. "Pedro was his name. But come on quick." + +"Two of you boys search this cabin and the woods around," ordered the +sheriff, "and two of you go up to Seagreave's cabin. The rest come along +with me." + +Led by Mrs. Nitschkan, still volubly lamenting her loss, they started +down the hill toward the ravine, when the sheriff suddenly looked up to +see upon the crest of the hill just before it dipped into a descending +slope two horsemen at full gallop, both horses and riders outlined +against the sky. + +"Our men are up there, boys," he cried. "Quick. I've got the fastest +horse in the county, and we'll get them before they get to three rocks." + +He was back to his horse again and on it and up the hill before his men +were fairly in the saddle. It was a race after that, and so rapidly did +he gain on Gallito and José that it looked as if his prediction of +getting them before they reached three rocks was about to be verified. +"I must do it, I must do it," he kept muttering to himself, "for it's +bad going after that, and it'll take us all some time to find him." + +He was lessening the distance between them with every long, powerful +stride of his horse, but already the three rocks, gaunt and high, loomed +before him as if forming an impassable barrier across the road. +Suddenly, just as José and Gallito had almost reached them and the +sheriff was gaining upon the fugitives in great leaps, he saw them +swerve their horses aside and dash into a clump of trees to the right of +the rocks. + +"Oh, the fools! the fools! I got 'em now. Instead of going for the +rocks, they've made for the trees." + +A few minutes later he and his men found the horses ridden by Gallito +and José blown and hard-breathing among the trees, but no trace could +they discover of the men they sought. Beyond the three rocks the +character of the hills changed strikingly. Instead of the wide, +undulating, wooded plateau, over which riding was so easy, the mountains +suddenly seemed split by mighty gashes, a great pocket of crevasses and +towering cliffs. + +The sheriff and his men beat about aimlessly and conscientiously for +several hours, but in vain. José and Gallito had long before "hit" the +secret trail. So finally the sheriff, who was inclined to put less faith +than ever in Hanson's representations, and convinced in his own mind +that Gallito was merely conniving at the escape of an unregenerate +brother, and that Mrs. Nitschkan's tale was true, called off his men and +rode home. "The cuss ain't important," he remarked, "and I guess +Gallito'll be glad enough to make up Nitschkan's loss to her and keep +her mouth shut." + + * * * * * + +It was evening. Pearl and Seagreave sat in the door of the cabin. Her +head drooped, her hands lay listlessly in her lap, and her brooding gaze +was fixed on the soft, dark night. "Oh," she cried at last, "how can I +do anything but leave you? Look at the mischief I've done in the world. +Look at it!" + +Seagreave clasped his arms about her and laid his cheek on hers. "Let's +forget it all, Pearl, forget that you've been a firebrand and I've been +a quitter, and begin life all over again. There's only one thing in it, +anyway, and that's love." + +"Just love," she answered softly. "Well, love's enough." + + + + * * * * * + + + +APPLETON'S RECENT BOOKS + + +NOVELS + +JAPONETTE (The Turning Point). By Robert W. Chambers, author of "The +Common Law," "The Firing Line," "The Fighting Chance," "Iole," etc. With +26 pictures by Charles Dana Gibson. Inlay on Cover. Cloth, $1.35 net. +Postpaid, $1.47. + +"Japonette" is one of the most delightful stories Mr. Chambers has ever +written. It is the romance of a bewilderingly pretty girl and a young +New York society man. Just as they come to know each other, Fate steps +in and renders them both penniless by wrecking the great firm in which +their fortunes are invested. How the idle young man, without occupation +or profession, is moved to swing about and take up the business of life +in dead earnest is told with the brilliance and animation which are Mr. +Chambers's chief assets. "Perhaps there are some people who would not +like 'Japonette'; if such there are one ought to be sorry for +them."--_Boston Transcript_. + + +THE PRICE SHE PAID. By David Graham Phillips, author of "The Grain of +Dust," "The Husband's Story," "Old Wives for New," etc. 12mo. Cloth, +$1.30 net. Postpaid, $1.42. + +"The Price She Paid" is the story of a young woman, raised in luxury and +idleness, who by the sudden death of her father, is thrown upon her own +resources. Talented and determined, she sets out to be an opera singer, +but the way is long and rough and she is obliged to pay the full price +before success crowns her efforts. "Little idea is conveyed in a brief +outline of the terseness and vigor of the story. It is a very +significant book for a variety of reasons."--_Philadelphia Press_. "It +is a question whether among the dozens of flesh and blood people whom +David Graham Phillips has created there be one more genuinely real than +this Mildred Gower. Again the marvel of the man is upon us in the full +measure of his realistic artistry."--_Washington Star._ + + +THE FAVOR OF KINGS. By Mary Hastings Bradley. Illustrated. Cloth, $1.30 +net. Postpaid, $1.42. + +The most spectacular romance of English history--the story of beautiful, +proud, ill-fated Anne Boleyn, second wife of Henry VIII and mother of +Queen Elizabeth. "There is no moment when the long, thrilling tale, well +constructed, well characterized, crammed with rapid action, fails to +interest and convince."--_Chicago Record-Herald._ + + +THE SHERIFF OF BADGER. By George Pattullo. Illustrated. Cloth, $1.25 +net. Postpaid, $1.37. + +A vigorous romance of the cowboy country. A story of the modern cowboy +of the Southwest, the man who does not live with a gun in his hand, but +who fights to a finish when necessity demands it. The Sheriff of Badger +is a flesh and blood individual of pluck and quiet daring. His breezy +adventures will keep you keenly interested and highly entertained. + + +THE MAKER OF OPPORTUNITIES. By George Gibbs, author of "The Bolted +Door," "The Forbidden Way," etc. Illustrated. Cloth, $1.25 net. +Postpaid, $1.37. + +A bright, breezy story about a young club man, who spends all of his +time and most of his comfortable income in providing matrimonial and +other opportunities for his friends. "Very entertaining, full of dash +and vivacity and of cleverness."--_Richmond Times Dispatch._ + + +THE DIARY OF A FRESHMAN. By Charles Macomb Flandrau, author of "Viva +Mexico," "Prejudices," etc. New edition. 12mo. Cloth, 75 cents net. +Postpaid, 87 cents. + +This classic of undergraduate life relates the adventures and +misadventures of a youth fresh from a Western home, who is suddenly +dropped into the turmoil of his opening year at a great Eastern college. +From the moment that "Mamma left for home" right up to Class Day, the +author chronicles minutely and most amusingly the experiences of his +freshman hero. + + +HALCYONE. By Elinor Glyn, author of "The Reason Why," "His Hour," etc. +Cloth, $1.30 net. Postpaid, $1.42. + +Mrs. Glyn's new novel is a very modern love story in which the +principals are a dreamy little girl--a finished product of Greek life +and thought--and a rising young politician, with a fine old professor as +the god in the machine. The scenes are laid in a beautiful park in +England, and on the Continent. It is an up-to-date idyll, rich in +romance, rapid in action, pure, clean, wholesome, inspiring. The host of +readers of "The Reason Why" will find this new story exactly to their +liking. + + +SHARROW. By the Baroness von Hutten, author of "Pam," "Our Lady of the +Beeches," "He and Hecuba," etc. Cloth, $1.30 net. Postpaid, $1.42. + +"Sharrow" is a story of complicated plot woven around the possession of +a wonderful old estate owned by the Sharrows since the Middle Ages. "It +is a book of flesh and blood and character, of individuality and power. +Real people walk through its pages and real motives and emotions direct +the movement of the story."--_New York Evening Sun_. "The spell of +Sharrow is cast over the reader before he knows it."--_Baltimore News_. + + +FAITH BRANDON. By Henrietta Dana Skinner, author of "Espiritu Santo," +"Heart and Soul," etc. With Frontispiece. Cloth, $1.30 net. Postpaid, +$1.42. + +Mrs. Skinner's new novel has for its heroine a most piquant and +delightful American girl, who, at the age of sixteen, falls in love with +a Russian prince. He is a man of lofty character with a serious purpose +in life and devotes his energies to political journalism. The course of +true love runs anything but smoothly. The story is full of action and +incident, and has especial interest through its warmth and color, its +pictures of life in Russia and the humanness of its characters. "A novel +of purpose as well as an enchaining romance."--_Springfield Union_. + +_Appleton's Recent Books_ + + * * * * * + + +THE MYSTERY OF THE SECOND SHOT. + +By Rufus Gillmore. Illustrated with Pen-and-Ink Sketches by Herman +Heyer. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25 net. Postpaid, $1.37. + +Bertrand Newhall, a scheming Boston banker, gets control of an old, +reliable trust company, wrecks it to bolster up another business, and +disappears. Police and reporters hunt him in vain. As Ashley, a +reporter, is "combing" the neighborhood of Newhall's home for evidence, +a young girl draws him inside a house, where he finds the banker dead, a +pistol beside him. The police call it suicide, but Ashley thinks +differently, and ultimately he solves a problem quite new in the annals +of crime. + + +THE NAMELESS THING. By Melville Davisson Post, author of "The Gilded +Chair," etc. Illustrated. 12mo. Cloth, $1.25 net. Postpaid, $1.37. + +A thrilling mystery story. The queer death of a recluse in his library +is the main theme. There is absolutely no clue, and the mystery is +doubled by the fact that, although the room is shot up and in the +greatest disorder, both windows and door are found locked on the +inside--the man dead in a pool of his own blood. The clearing up of this +mystery leads the reader through many exciting adventures. "Something +exceptional in the way of detective stories. It is such stories as these +that dignify the art of fiction writing."--_Boston Transcript_. + + +THE TREVOR CASE. By Natalie S. Lincoln. Illustrated by Edmund Frederick. +12mo. Cloth, $1.30 net. Postpaid, $1.42. + +One of the most ingenious and exciting detective novels of recent years. +The scene is Washington. The beautiful young wife of the +Attorney-General is found murdered. A burglar is caught leaving the +house, but incriminating evidence points to other people high in +official and political life. There is a bewildering conflict of clues +and a series of startling climaxes before the case is cleared up. Not +one reader in fifty can guess the ending. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE BLACK PEARL*** + + +******* This file should be named 17418-8.txt or 17418-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/1/7/4/1/17418 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://www.gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/pglaf. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://www.gutenberg.org/about/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: +https://www.gutenberg.org/fundraising/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + |