Overland Part 52

"To Fort Yuma."

"To Fort Yuma! What for?"

"I may as well tell it," burst out Coronado angrily. "She is going there to nurse that officer. He escaped, but he has been sick, and she _will_ go."

"She must not go," whispered Garcia. "Oh, the ----." And here he called Clara a string of names which cannot be repeated. "She shall not go there," he continued. "She will marry him. Then the property is gone, and we are ruined. Oh, the ----." And then came another a.s.sortment of violent and vile epithets, such as are not found in dictionaries.

Coronado was anxious to divert and dissipate a rage which might make trouble; and as soon as he could get in a word, he asked, "But what have you been doing, my uncle?"

By dint of questioning and guessing he made out the story of the old man's adventures since leaving the hacienda. Garcia, in extreme terror of hanging, had gone straight to San Francisco and taken pa.s.sage for San Diego, with the intention of not stopping until he should be at least as far away as Santa Fe. But after a few hours at sea, he had recovered his wits and his courage, and asked himself, why should he fly? If Clara died, the property would be his, and if she survived, he ought to be near her; while as for Carlos, he would surely never expose and hang a man who could cut him off with a shilling. So he landed at Monterey, took the first coaster back to San Francisco, lurked about the city until he learned that the girl was still living, and was just about to put a bold front on the matter by going to see her at the hacienda, when he learned accidentally that she was on the point of voyaging southward. Puzzled and alarmed by this, he resolved to accompany her in her wanderings, and succeeded in getting himself quietly on board the Lolotte.

"Well, let us go on deck," said Coronado, when the old man had regained his tranquillity. "But let us be gentle, my uncle. We know how to govern ourselves, I hope. You will of course behave like a mother to our little cousin. Congratulate her on her recovery; apologize for your awkward mistake. It was caused by the coming on of the fit, you remember. A man who is about to have an attack of epilepsy can't of course tell one pocket from another. But such a man is all the more bound to be unctuous."

Clara received the old man cordially, although she would have preferred not to see him there, fearing lest he should oppose her nursing project.

But as nothing was said on this matter, and as Garcia put his least cloven foot foremost, the trio not only got on amicably together, but seemed to enjoy one another's society. This was no common feat by the way; each of the three had a great load of anxiety; it was wonderful that they should not show it. Coronado, for instance, while talking like a bird song, was planning how he could get rid of Garcia, and carry Clara back to San Francisco. The idea of pushing the old man overboard was inadmissible; but could he not scare him ash.o.r.e at the next port by stories of a leak? As for Clara, he could not imagine how to manage her, she was so potent with her wealth and with her beauty. He was still thinking of these things, and prattling mellifluously of quite other things, when the Lolotte luffed up under the lee of the little island of Alcatraz.

"What does this mean?" he asked, looking suspiciously at the fortifications, with the American flag waving over them.

"Stop here to take in commissary stores for Fort Yuma," explained the thin, sallow, grave, meek-looking, and yet resolute Yankee mate.

The chain cable rattled through the hawse hole, and in no long while the loading commenced, lasting until nightfall. During this time Coronado chanced to learn that an officer was expected on board who would sail as far as San Diego; and, as all uniforms were bugbears to him, he watched for the new pa.s.senger with a certain amount of anxiety; taking care, by the way, to say nothing of him to Clara. About eight in the evening, as the girl was playing some trivial game of cards with Garcia in the cabin, a splashing of oars alongside called Coronado on deck. It was already dark; a sailor was standing by the manropes with a lantern; the captain was saying in a grumbling tone, "Very late, sir."

"Had to wait for orders, captain," returned a healthy, ringing young voice which struck Coronado like a shot.

"Orders!" muttered the skipper. "Why couldn't they have had them ready?

Here we are going to have a southeaster."

There was anxiety as well as impatience in his voice; but Coronado just now could not think of tempests; his whole soul was in his eyes. The next instant he beheld in the ruddy light of the lantern the face of the man who was his evil genius, the man whose death he had so long plotted for and for a time believed in, the man who, as he feared, would yet punish him for his misdeeds. He was so thoroughly beaten and cowed by the sight that he made a step or two toward the companionway, with the purpose of hiding in the cabin. Then desperation gave him courage, and he walked straight up to Thurstane.

"My dear Lieutenant!" he cried, trying to seize the young fellow's hand.

"Once more welcome to life! What a wonder! Another escape. You are a second Orlando--almost a Don Quixote. And where are your two Sancho Panzas?"

"You here!" was Thurstane's grim response, and he did not take the proffered hand.

"Come!" implored Coronado, stepping toward the waist of the vessel and away from the cabin. "This way, if you please," he urged, beckoning earnestly. "I have a word to say to you in private."

Not a tone of this conversation had been heard below. Before the boat had touched the side the crew were laboring at the noisy windla.s.s with their shouts of "Yo heave ho! heave and pawl! heave hearty ho!" while the mate was screaming from the knight-heads, "Heave hearty, men--heave hearty.

Heave and raise the dead. Heave and away."

Amid this uproar Coronado continued: "You won't shake hands with me, Lieutenant Thurstane. As a gentleman, speaking to another gentleman, I ask an explanation."

Thurstane hesitated; he had ugly suspicions enough, but no proofs; and if he could not prove guilt, he must not charge it.

"Is it because we abandoned you?" demanded Coronado. "We had reason. We heard that you were dead. The muleteers reported Apaches. I feared for the safety of the ladies. I pushed on. You, a gentleman and an officer--what else would you have advised?"

"Let it go," growled Thurstane. "Let that pa.s.s. I won't talk of it--nor of other things. But," and here he seemed to shake with emotion, "I want nothing more to do with you--you nor your family. I have had suffering enough."

"Ah, it is with _her_ that you quarrel rather than with me," inferred Coronado impudently, for he had recovered his self-possession. "Certainly, my poor Lieutenant! You have reason. But remember, so has she. She is enormously rich and can have any one. That is the way these women understand life."

"You will oblige me by saying not another word on that subject," broke in Thurstane savagely. "I got her letter dismissing me, and I accepted my fate without a word, and I mean never to see her again. I hope that satisfies you."

"My dear Lieutenant," protested Coronado, "you seem to intimate that I influenced her decision. I beg you to believe, on my word of honor as a gentleman, that I never urged her in any way to write that letter."

"Well--no matter--I don't care," replied the young fellow in a voice like one long sob. "I don't care whether you did or not. The moment she could write it, no matter how or why, that was enough. All I ask is to be left alone--to hear no more of her."

"I am obliged to speak to you of her," said Coronado. "She is aboard."

"Aboard!" exclaimed Thurstane, and he made a step as if to reach the sh.o.r.e or to plunge into the sea.

"I am sorry for you," said Coronado, with a simplicity which seemed like sincerity. "I thought it my duty to warn you."

"I cannot go back," groaned the young fellow. "I must go to San Diego. I am under orders."

"You must avoid her. Go to bed late. Get up early. Keep out of her way."

Turning his back, Thurstane walked away from this cruel and hated counsellor, not thinking at all of him however, but rather of the deep beneath, a refuge from trouble.

We must slip back to his last adventure with Texas Smith, and learn a little of what happened to him then and up to the present time.

It will be remembered how the bushwhacker sat in ambush; how, just as he was about to fire at his proposed victim, his horse whinnied; and how this whinny caused Thurstane's mule to rear suddenly and violently. The rearing saved the rider's life, for the bullet which was meant for the man buried itself in the forehead of the beast, and in the darkness the a.s.sa.s.sin did not discover his error. But so severe was the fall and so great Thurstane's weakness that he lost his senses and did not come to himself until daybreak.

There he was, once more abandoned to the desert, but rich in a full haversack and a dead mule. Having breakfasted, and thereby given head and hand a little strength, he set to work to provide for the future by cutting slices from the carca.s.s and spreading them out to dry, well knowing that this land of desolation could furnish neither wolf nor bird of prey to rob his larder. This work done, he pushed on at his best speed, found and fed his companions, and led them back to the mule, their storehouse. After a day of rest and feasting came a march to the Cactus Pa.s.s, where the three were presently picked up by a caravan bound to Santa Fe, which carried them on for a number of days until they met a train of emigrants going west. Thus it was that Glover reached California, and Thurstane and Sweeny Fort Yuma.

Once in quiet, the young fellow broke down, and for weeks was too sick to write to Clara, or to any one. As soon as he could sit up he sent off letter after letter, but after two months of anxious suspense no answer had come, and he began to fear that she had never reached San Francisco.

At last, when he was half sick again with worrying, arrived a horrible epistle in Clara's hand and signed by her name, informing him of her monstrous windfall of wealth and terminating the engagement. The crudest thing in this cruel forgery was the sentence, "Do you not think that in paying courtship to me in the desert you took unfair advantage of my loneliness?"

She had trampled on his heart and flouted his honor; and while he writhed with grief he writhed also with rage. He could not understand it; so different from what she had seemed; so unworthy of what he had believed her to be! Well, her head had been turned by riches; it was just like a woman; they were all thus. Thus said Thurstane, a fellow as ignorant of the female kind as any man in the army, and scarcely less ignorant than the average man of the navy. He declared to himself that he would never have anything more to do with her, nor with any of her false s.e.x. At twenty-three he turned woman-hater, just as Mrs. Stanley at forty-five had turned man-hater, and perhaps for much the same sort of reason.

Shortly after Thurstane had received what he called his cashiering, his company was ordered from Fort Yuma to San Francisco. It had garrisoned the Alcatraz fort only two days, and he had not yet had a chance to visit the city, when he was sent on this expedition to San Diego to hunt down a deserting quartermaster-sergeant. The result was that he found himself shipped for a three days' voyage with the woman who had made him first the happiest man in the army and then the most miserable.

How should he endure it? He would not see her; the truth is that he could not endure the trial; but what he said to himself was that he _would_ not.

In the darkness tears forced their way out of his eyes and mingled with the spray which the wind was already flinging over the bows. Crying! Three months ago, if any man had told him that he was capable of it, he would have considered himself insulted and would have felt like fighting. Now he was not even ashamed of it, and would hardly have been ashamed if it had been daylight. He was so thoroughly and hopelessly miserable that he did not care what figure he cut.

But, once more, what should he do? Oh, well, he would follow Coronado's advice; yes, d.a.m.n him! follow the scoundrel's advice; he could think of nothing for himself. He would stay out until late; then he would steal below and go to bed; after that he would keep his stateroom. However, it was unpleasant to remain where he was, for the spray was beginning to drench the waist as well as the forecastle; and, the quarter-deck being clear of pa.s.sengers, he staggered thither, dropped under the starboard bulwark, rolled himself in his cloak, and lay brooding.

Meanwhile Coronado had amused Clara below until he felt seasick and had to take to his berth. Escaping thus from his duennaship, she wanted to see a storm, as she called the half-gale which was blowing, and clambered bravely alone to the quarter-deck, where the skipper took her in charge, showed her the compa.s.s, walked her up and down a little, and finally gave her a post at the foot of the shrouds. Thurstane had recognized her by the light of the binnacle, and once more he thought, as weakly as a scared child, "What shall I do?" After hiding his face for a moment he uncovered it desperately, resolving to see whether she would speak. She did look at him; she even looked steadily and sharply, as if in recognition; but after a while she turned tranquilly away to gaze at the sea.

Forgetting that no lamp was shining upon him, and that she probably had no cause for expecting to find him here, Thurstane believed that she had discovered who he was and that her mute gesture confirmed his rejection.

Under this throttling of his last hope he made no protest, but silently wished himself on the battle-field, falling with his face to the foe. For several minutes they remained thus side by side.

The Lolotte was now well at sea, the wind and waves rising rapidly, the motion already considerable. Presently there was an order of "Lay aloft and furl the skysails," and then short shouts resounded from the darkness, showing that the work was being done. But in spite of this easing the vessel labored a good deal, and heavy spurts of spray began to fly over the quarter-deck rail.

"I think, Miss, you had better go below unless you want to get wet,"

observed the skipper, coming up to Clara. "We shall have a splashing night of it."

Taking the nautical arm, Clara slid and tottered away, leaving Thurstane lying on the sloppy deck.