The Terms of Surrender Part 29

And he was gone. Dacre turned his face to the east. During the long journey to Washington, where he meant to visit some friends before crossing the Atlantic, he thought often of Power. Speaking of him one day to a man of some influence in the Department of State, he inquired if there were any means of keeping track of the wanderer without his cognizance.

"Yes," said the official. "We can send out a private consular note. Have you any idea which way he is heading?"

"Not the faintest. From a sort of hint he let drop, he may intend joining a Buddhist community in India or Ceylon. At any rate, he had been reading some book on India. But the a.s.sumption is too vague to be of value."

"Well, I'll see what can be done."

By the next mail, every United States consulate in the world was asked to report to Washington if John Darien Power, an American citizen, appeared within its jurisdiction. No report ever arrived. Long before the inquiry reached the one consul who might have learned something of his whereabouts, Power had vanished off the map; a phrase which, in this instance, happened to be literally true. Thus, Dacre's well-meant efforts to keep in touch with his friend were frustrated, and, for the time, he drops out of this history.

When Power arrived in San Francisco, though his definite project as to the future involved a long disappearance from the haunts of civilized men, he had not decided where to pitch his tent. He had actually thought, as Dacre surmised, of going to the inner fastnesses of the Himalayas; but his voluntary exile connoted something more than mere effacement--it meant suffering, and sacrifice, and the succor of earth's miserable ones--and the barrier of language shut out the East. Again, there was little, if any, element of danger attached to a sojourn in the hilly solitudes of Hindustan; it even appealed to his student's proclivities. So, for that reason alone, it was dismissed. Spanish was the only foreign tongue he was thoroughly conversant with, and his thoughts turned to Spanish-speaking South America. He made up his mind to go there, and search for his field.

San Francisco was the city of his childhood. In happier conditions, it could hardly fail to evoke pleasant memories. The Moores lived there, and they, aided by a host of oldtime acquaintances, would gladly have made him welcome; but he avoided such snares by driving straight to the offices of the Pacific Steamship Company, where he ascertained that the mail steamer _Panama_ sailed for Valparaiso that day.

He was on board within the hour, and remained in his cabin until the engines started. Then he went on deck, and bade farewell to a land where he had worked, and dreamed, and endured, during the full years of his lost youth. Practically his last intimate glimpse of the West, save for distant views of the California coast, and a fleeting call at San Diego, was obtained when the vessel pa.s.sed through the Golden Gate.

Bitter-sweet recollections warred in heart and brain as he watched the beautiful and well-loved panorama. Every bold promontory and sequestered bay of the miles of narrow straits were familiar to his eyes. If there was aught of weakness in his composition, it must have made its presence felt then; but that there could be any turning back did not even occur to his vague thoughts. He might be moving swiftly into unfathomable night; his action might be deemed either stubborn or irresponsible; he might be regarded as the victim of deep delusion; but at least it must be said of him that he never flinched from the barren outlook or admitted the possibility of retreat. Hitherto love for his mother had exercised the most lasting and salutary influence on his life. The depth and intensity of that love was the gage of his horror when he discovered that he had caused her death. His emotions were incapable of logical a.n.a.lysis. She was dead. His forbidden pa.s.sion for another woman had killed her. She might have lived seven years. For seven years he would placate her spirit "in weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness."

His strength was that of the mind. He was of the order of chivalry. His renunciation would have been well understood by a few men who lived and had their being a thousand years ago. In the America of the early '90's, had his undertaking been known, which it was not, nor ever has been till this writing, the heedless majority must have wagged sapient noddles, and cried in chorus, "He is mad!"

A discriminating purser allotted him to the captain's table, and at dinner that evening he found himself next to a Chilean merchant. This man sat on his left. On the right was an empty chair, which adjoined the commander's position at the head of the table.

The captain greeted him with the ready camaraderie of the sea.

"My ward has not put in an appearance," he said, nodding toward the vacant place. "She can't be ill yet, anyhow; but, like most women, I suppose, she is unpunctual."

"Is lack of punctuality a feminine failing?" said Power, seeing that he was expected to answer.

The sailor laughed. "It is evident you are not a married man, Mr. Power, or you wouldn't need to ask," he said.

"How true!" piped the Chilean, in a singularly high-pitched voice. The people at that end of the table grinned, and the Chilean instantly won a reputation as a humorist. Some days pa.s.sed before they discovered that he had brought off his only joke thus early in the voyage. He possessed a fund of information about nitrate and guano; but these topics were not popular, so his conversational talent exhausted itself in that one comment. On this occasion it happened to be appropriate.

Power, who had summed him up as a dull dog at a glance, was surveying him with a degree of surprise when he became aware that the missing lady had arrived. She had slipped into her chair quietly, and was apologizing for being late.

"I am usually a most methodical person," she said; "but I mislaid a key----"

She broke off, in smiling embarra.s.sment, because of the general laughter, and the captain had to explain that the wretched males present had been vilifying her s.e.x.

"There was one exception, though," he rattled on. "Our friend on your left seemed to think otherwise. Mr. Power, let me introduce you to Miss Marguerite Sinclair."

Yielding to convention--most potent of human ties--Power turned with a polite bow; but not even his preoccupied mind was proof against the feeling of stupefaction caused by his first impression of the captain's "ward." She certainly owned a girlish and graceful figure, and her brown hair was glossy and abundant; but her skin was withered, and that side of her face which was visible bore a number of livid scars. It was impossible to determine her age. The slim, willowy body and really beautiful hair apparently indicated youth; but the appalling disfigurement of the face, which extended from the top of the cheek to the slender column of her neck, simply forbade any accurate estimate.

The pity of it was that her profile was faultless, and a little pink sh.e.l.l of an ear was almost fantastically opposed to the shriveled and scar-seamed features adjoining it. Yet, in some indescribable way, she reminded him of Nancy, and the notion was so grotesque and abhorrent that he shuddered.

Luckily, her attention was drawn for a moment by a steward, and he had recovered his wits before she looked at him. Then he found that her eyes were peculiarly brilliant. He noted, with positive relief, that they were not blue, like Nancy's, but brown. They had a curiously penetrative quality, too, which seemed to dispel the repugnant effect of the accident. He saw now that she must have sustained some grave injury, which marred her good looks.

"Thank you," she said composedly. "Usually, I have to fight my own battles. It will be quite a relief to count on an ally so valiant that he draws the sword without waiting to see the person whose cause he espouses."

Her voice was cultured and incisive. It seemed to offer a challenge to all the world; yet it held an arresting note of cheerful irony that betokened an equable temperament. After the first shock of surprise, almost of dismay, had pa.s.sed, Power fancied that she carried herself thus bravely as a protest against the brutality of fate.

They spoke but little during the progress of the meal, and he avoided looking at her. Somehow, he was aware that she would resent such delicacy; but the alternative of a too curious inspection was distasteful. Of two evils he chose the less; though the fact that any choice was called for in the matter was embarra.s.sing.

He gathered that the captain and Miss Sinclair were old acquaintances.

There were allusions to relatives and friends. She was addressed as "Meg." It was to be inferred that her mother was dead, that she had been attending a session of the Los Angeles University, and that she was now on the way to rejoin her father.

Some man at the table spoke of the pending Presidential campaign, and the "sixteen to one" currency ratio started a lively argument. An advocate of a gold basis snorted derisively that silver could be mined profitably at eighteen cents an ounce.

"How true!" said the Chilean, and again he scored.

Power escaped to the deck. He lit a cigar, and leaned on the starboard rail, gazing at a magnificent sunset which glorified the infinity of waters. He wished now he had avoided a mail steamer, with its elaborate elegancies. Had he not acted so precipitately he could have sought the rough hospitality of some grimy tramp, whence woman was barred, and whose skipper would leave him in peace.

Suddenly he was disturbed by Miss Sinclair, who joined him at the rail with a quiet confidence of demeanor that spoke volumes for her self-possession.

"Though I appeared to make light of it at the moment, I was glad to hear that you defended me," she said, smiling at him with those l.u.s.trous, deep-seeing eyes.

He was rendered nearly tongue-tied by confusion; but managed to blurt out, awkwardly enough, that his championship had been involuntary. She laughed quite pleasantly.

"Does that mean that, now you have seen me, you deem me capable of any iniquity?" she said.

"You give me credit for a faculty of divination which I do not possess,"

he retorted, wondering if she was really alluding to her own unsightliness.

"Ah, I think I shall like you," she said. "Most people whom I meet for the first time try to show their pity by being sympathetic. They simply daren't say, 'Good gracious! what has happened to your poor face?' so they put on their best hospital-ward-visitor air, and feel so sorry for me that I want to smack them. Now, you admit candidly that I may be as villainous as I look, and such honesty is a positive relief."

"Even to earn your good opinion I refuse to accept that unfair reading of my words," he said.

"Then what did you mean?"

"I'm afraid I was talking at random."

"You don't look that sort of person. Really, Mr. Power, you and I will get on famously together if we tell each other the real truth. Are we to be fellow-pa.s.sengers as far as Valparaiso?"

"Yes."

"There, you see! Those other Philistines would have smirked and said, 'I hope so.' I shall enjoy this trip. Generally, a sea-voyage bores me."

"Are you much traveled, then?"

"I live in Patagonia."

"Does that statement answer my question?"

"Well, yes. No one lives in Patagonia for amus.e.m.e.nt, and some among those who are compelled to reside there get away as often as their means permit. Patagonian boarding-houses don't advertise 'young and musical society,' I a.s.sure you. Our population is something under one to the square mile."

"My knowledge of the Patagonian is limited; but I have always understood that he requires just about that amount of s.p.a.ce."

"Ah, no! Our poor giants are nearly extinct. There is hardly a hundred of them, all told."

"My! Who, or what, cleared them out?"