Another day and the Idaho was battling for her life and that of every soul aboard. Forging her way southward, she took the furious buffets of the gale on the starboard quarter--"the right front," as Turnbull would have put it had he not been too ill to care a fig where she was. .h.i.t, and only wished she might go down if that would keep her still. Sea after sea burst over the dripping decks and tossed her like a c.o.c.kle sh.e.l.l upon the waters. Time and again the bows would plunge deep in some rushing surge and then, uplifting, send torrents washing aft and pour cataracts from her sides. Long before the dawn of day the red-eyed commander had ordered the southward course abandoned and headed his laboring craft for the opposite sh.o.r.es. Harbor there was none north of the deep sheltered bay of La Paz, but there would be relief from the tremendous poundings of the billows when once under the lee of Old California. Obedient to her helm, the Idaho now met "dead ahead" both wind and sea. The rolling measurably ceased. The pitching fore and aft continued, but the pa.s.senger list by this time cared no longer to discriminate. It was all one to all but one of their number. Loring, of the engineers, thanks to long weeks of illness of another sort, was mercifully exempted from the pangs of seasickness, but the sights and sounds between decks were more than could long be borne, and, making his way forward shortly after dawn, he had succeeded in borrowing a spare sou-wester and pair of sea boots from the second officer, and, equipped in these and a rubber coat, leaving nothing but his nose and mouth in evidence, he was boosted up the narrow stairway to the shelter of the pilot-house on the uppermost deck--the Idaho had no bridge--and there he saw the sun come up to the meridian and the sea go gradually down as the steamer found smoother waters under the lee of San Ildefonso. Only lightly laden, the stanch little craft had well-nigh "jumped out of her boots," as the jovial skipper expressed it, and now, all brine and beaming satisfaction after his long hours of stormy vigil, he clapped Loring on the shoulder, complimented him on his possession of a "sea stomach" and ordered coffee served forthwith. They were steaming slowly along at half-speed now, taking a breathing spell before attempting the next round, and the captain waxed confidential.

"What's wrong with that pretty little niece?" he asked. "She was bright enough the day they came aboard on our up trip. Now, the stewardess tells me she fainted dead away and has been begging to be put ash.o.r.e all night."

Loring couldn't say.

"But you helped carry her down, you and Turnbull. The stewardess says you were both very kind to her, where her own people neglected her. I didn't fancy that scrub Escalante. Do you know anything about him or her own people?"

"Nothing--to speak of," said Loring.

"Fernandez, one of those young Guaymas swells, says the mother was own sister to De la Cruz--married against his wishes when she was a mere girl--died a few years later, and that Don Ramon offered to adopt and educate her little girl, but only lately would the Escalantes give her up. All I know is that she's too d.a.m.ned miserable about something else to be even seasick like the rest of 'em. You'd a-been down there with Turnbull if you hadn't just had more'n your share of illness," added he, with the mariner's slight disapprobation of the landsman who defies initiations of Neptune.

"Very possibly," said Loring.

"The purser tells me Escalante gave him a little packet belonging to her--very valuable, which he ordered kept in the safe until their agent should call for it at 'Frisco."

"Indeed!" said Loring, looking up in quick interest.

"Fact," said the skipper. "Now, have some more coffee? I'm going to turn in for forty winks. Let the steward know when you want anything. n.o.body else will. We've got to face some more rollers after awhile. I da.s.sen't go inside Carmen Island."

But Loring had something more engrossing to think of than breakfast or luncheon. So there was a little packet in the purser's safe, was there?

Valuable and not to be delivered except to their agent in 'Frisco. It was in Pancha's name, yet not subject to Pancha's order. Why that discrimination? And it was given the purser by Escalante--brother of _the_ Escalante--another brother of the accomplished sharper of Sancho's ranch. A precious trinity of blood relations were these! Small wonder Don Ramon, had opposed his girl sister's union with one of their number.

Now, what on earth could that small packet contain, and was it likely that the valuables were any more valuable than those s.n.a.t.c.hed from his saddle-bags the night of the a.s.sault at Gila Bend?--the watch and diamonds of the late Captain Nevins now vanished into thin air, apparently, for not a trace of him had appeared since the night he rode away from Camp Cooke.

In genuine distress of mind, Loring had written from Yuma, as soon as the doctor would permit, to the address penned by Nevins in presence of the court, informing that vagabond officer's wife that the valuables he had been charged to place in her hands had been forcibly taken from him, after he himself had been a.s.saulted and stricken senseless; that every effort had been made to recover them, but without success; that he deplored their loss and her many misfortunes, and begged to be informed if he could serve her in any other way. The doctors had promised him that he would be restored by a sea voyage. It would be three weeks, probably, before he could reach San Francisco, and meantime he knew from the captain's admission that she was probably in need.

"No one," wrote Loring, "is dependent upon me, and I beg your acceptance as a loan, as a temporary accommodation, or as anything you please, of the inclosed draft." (It covered nearly every dollar he happened to have to his credit in the bank at San Francisco, though he had pay accounts still collectible.) It took nearly ten days for answer to reach him, and Loring hid himself away to read it when the letter came, addressed in a hand he knew too well:

"Naomi, my beloved sister, is prostrated by her sorrows and anxieties," it began, "and I must be her amanuensis--I who would die for her, yet who shrink from this task, well knowing, though she does not, how hard it is to write to one to whom I have given perhaps such infinite pain. Indeed, I should not have had courage to write had she not required it of me, had not your most generous offer and action demanded response. But for your aid my heartbroken sister and I would by this time have had no roof to cover our heads.

These people had refused to house us longer. As soon as she is well enough to move and I can obtain the means from Eastern friends we shall sail for New Orleans, where she expects to find friends and employment, and she bids me say that within the year you shall be repaid. Meantime the thought that you, too, have been made a sufferer, all on account of that unprincipled scoundrel who has deceived and deserted her, weighs upon her spirits as it does on mine. It is not the loss of the jewels (though we would have been beyond the possibility of want had they reached her) that we mourn; it is that one whom I fear I have sorely angered, perhaps past all forgiveness, should have to suffer so much more on our account, and yet if you only knew--if I could only explain! But this is futile.

Despise me if you will, yet believe that my grat.i.tude is beyond words.

"GERALDINE ALLYN.

"P. S.--Should you care to see--sister on your arrival we shall probably still be here."

Then there had come, not to him but to the post surgeon at Yuma, another letter just before Loring started down the Colorado. The doctor was with his patient at the moment, and the superscription caught the latter's eye. The doctor changed color and looked embarra.s.sed as he read.

Evidently he did not desire to be questioned, nor was he, at the time, for Loring had a way of thinking before he spoke, but as the doctor completed certain injunctions at parting, the engineer turned full upon him:

"Any news of Nevins in the letter you got this morning?"

The doctor flushed, looked bothered and confused, then finally fished the letter from an inner pocket.

"Read it yourself," said he, and turned away. It was from Miss Allyn. It apologized for intruding on a stranger, on his time and patience, but she knew he had been Mr. Loring's medical adviser, and she felt compelled to make certain inquiries, her sister being still unable to write for herself. The doctor was probably aware that Mr. Loring had written apprising them of the loss of certain articles of great value that had been intrusted to his care and intended for them. He had expressed the utmost sorrow and had tendered certain reimburs.e.m.e.nt (that check was for two hundred dollars, not a cent less), not a fortieth part of the value of the lost articles, probably, but now they were in receipt of a letter from Captain Nevins that must have come by private hand to San Francisco, telling them that he must go forth to seek his fortunes anew; that his wife would never hear from him until he could come with full hands; that he had sent her every penny and possession he had--enough to keep her in comfort--and if Lieutenant Loring did not promptly deliver the same to take legal steps to compel him to do so, as he, Nevins, was now convinced the officer might appropriate them to his own use, if he could find any way to cover his breach of trust, such as swearing they were stolen from him. Captain Nevins had written other things in condemnation of Mr. Loring which neither Mrs. Nevins nor herself could believe; but--it did seem strange that an officer could find no safe method of sending valuable jewels when so much depended on his fidelity.

Loring read no further. His blue eyes were blazing already and his face was white with wrath when he returned the missive to his friend, who, knowing nothing of Loring's past infatuation for the writer, wondered at sight of his emotion.

"Why, Loring," said he, "you take this shallow girl too seriously. It's the way with women all over the world. They can never wholly acquit a man of complicity when they have suffered a loss. If that package were with you on the Idaho and she was to go down in midocean and the jewelry with her, some women would say you scuttled the ship in order to rob them."

The doctor's name, it must be observed, is unrecorded, because of the extremity of his cynicism. He went back to Yuma and his duties and stowed that letter away, to be answered later on. What the writer said her sister desired most to know was whether Mr. Loring had sustained any injury that might affect his mind or memory, and the doctor sniffed indignantly at the notion while we read, yet marveled much at the effect that half-uttered accusation had on his usually calm, self-poised patient. He spoke of it to Turnbull when that veteran came hurrying in by stage and followed Loring down the murky stream, only just in time to catch the steamer, but Turnbull paid faint heed. Loring was still weak, he said, and a man of sensitive honor might well be wrathful at such insinuations.

And now as Loring clung to the rail upon the lofty deck and gazed out over the waste of tumbling waters toward the barren sh.o.r.es, he was thinking deeply of that letter, of the strange bent of mind that could dictate such unjustifiable suggestion--if not accusation. He was thinking, too, of Pancha and that little packet in the purser's safe, when suddenly that officer himself came popping up the narrow stairway and poked his unprotected head into the whistling wind.

"Lieutenant, come below and have a bite while we're here off Ildefonso.

We'll be turning handsprings in half an hour," and Loring followed to the steward's cuddy where a smoking luncheon awaited them, and the silent soldier fell to with the appet.i.te that follows fever. Purser and steward looked on with admiration.

"I'll prescribe a course of typhoid to the next friend of mine that contemplates a voyage like this," said the former presently. "It made you invulnerable, but was it typhoid?"

"No--some head trouble."

"Sunstruck?" queried the purser. "Hot as it is, that don't often happen in Arizona--too dry."

"Struck, but not by sun--pistol-b.u.t.t, perhaps," said Loring. "Night attack of Gila Bend--robbers."

"Oh, Lord, yes! I remember. I heard about that," said the genial purser.

"Got away with some money, didn't they?"

"No money, but with a valuable package," and the blue eyes were fixed intently on the purser as he spoke, while the steward uncorked another pint of Margaux. "A tin box about eight by three, containing a watch and jewels. You sometimes get such for safekeeping, do you not?"

"Got one now," was the prompt reply, as the officer smacked his lips and held out his gla.s.s for another sip of the red wine of France. "Old Escalante gave it to me at Guaymas. It's the little senorita's."

CHAPTER XII.

The afternoon and night that followed brought little comfort to the cabin pa.s.sengers. Not till nearly dark did the steamer find the shelter of another island, and all the intervening hours she wallowed in the trough of the sea, with the wind abeam, and by the time the heights of Carmen Island loomed between them and the red glow of the sunset skies, Turnbull had thrice wished himself in hotter climes than even Arizona, and could only feebly d.a.m.n his junior for coming down to ask if there were not something he could do for him.

"Yes, take this pistol and shoot me," moaned the sufferer. "No, of course I don't want brandy and water, nor you nor anybody. It's simply scandalous for you to be up and well. Go 'way!" And though Loring sorely needed counsel, he felt that Turnbull was in no mood for talk, and so climbed back on deck again. He had made up his mind to tell the purser the whole story and to ask him to examine the contents of the package.

All the livelong night the Idaho plowed and careened through the rolling seas, gaining scant relief off Santa Catalina and San Jose, but when in the undimmed splendor of the morning sun she swept proudly into the placid, land-locked harbor of old La Paz, Loring was the only man among her pa.s.sengers to appear on deck. Even after she dropped anchor and one or two bedraggled victims were hoisted from below and dropped over the side to be rowed ash.o.r.e, none of the women of the gay Guaymas party was able to climb the stairs. The wind was gone by sundown, and the Idaho once more steering coastwise for Cape San Lucas. The night wore on and Loring was still alone when, just as the tinkle of the ship's bell told that nine o'clock had come, with a soft, warm air drifting off the land, a fragile little form issued slowly from the companionway, and the stewardess smiled invitingly on the blue-eyed officer, as though begging him to aid her feeble charge to a seat.

"I have brought the senorita up for half an hour. I made her come," said she, as she dumped the pile of shawls into a spreading chair and began preparing a nest, while Pancha, turning away at sight of Loring, sank to the end of the bench, the very seat she occupied as they put to sea from Guaymas. But now it was Loring who tendered his arm, and, calmly ignoring her evident if unspoken protest, aided in lifting her from the bench and seating her in the depths of the easy reclining chair. The stewardess, with practiced hand, carefully tucked the rugs about her, and bidding the little damsel make the most of the soft, salt air, while she herself ran below to prepare her chocolate, would have gone at once but for Pancha's trembling, yet restraining hand. The child seemed to cling to her in desperation. Rapidly and in low tone she poured forth a torrent of pleading, and the kind-hearted woman looked about her in perplexity and distress.

"What can I do, sir?" said she to Loring, in English. "This poor little thing has eaten nothing since she came aboard. She has cried herself sick. She is as weak as a baby and must have food, yet she will not let me go."

"Stay with her until she is calmer," said Loring. "I'll get what is needed."

"But I cannot. The other ladies call for me incessantly."

A little disk of gold was slipped quickly into the disengaged hand. "Let them call awhile but don't you go," was the double answer.

It is odd to note how soon the troubled waves subside along those summer sh.o.r.es. The Idaho was only lazily bowing and courtesying to Old Neptune now. A long, languorous heave of the billows, as though worn out with the furious lashing of the last few days, was the only greeting of the broadening sea as the steamer rounded the southeast headland and slowly bore away for Cape San Lucas. Little Pancha's dusky head was resting wearily, yet resignedly, on the pillow, her hand still clasping that of the stewardess, as an attendant from below appeared with a little tray and some scalding hot chocolate, some tender slices of the breast of chicken, some tempting little dainties were quickly set before her.

"Make her take them," whispered Loring from the shadows, and, once the effort was made and the "ice broken," the dark-eyed invalid ate almost eagerly. At three bells the stewardess was allowed to slip away for just a little more chocolate, and, glancing furtively, fearfully about her, Pancha was aware of a dim masculine form seated not ten feet away. She knew it was Loring, and yet could not move. She felt that he must presently rise and accost her, and she shrank from the meeting in dismay, yet soon began to look again, and to note that he had not changed his att.i.tude. Apparently indifferent to her presence, he was gazing dreamily out across the slowly-heaving billows, wherein the stars were dancing. The stewardess was gone full quarter of an hour, and in all that time he never even once glanced her way, and poor Pancha found her eyes flitting toward him every little while in something almost akin to fascination. Could it be that he had--forgotten?--or that he did not recognize her? Yet she had heard how both Loring and the other, that older officer, the Colonel Turnbull, had carried her below as she slowly rallied from her fainting spell two nights before. Surely she thought she remembered seeing recollection or recognition in the eyes of both, yet now when he had opportunity to accuse her, not one word did he attempt. She was warmed and comforted by the chocolate and the food. She enjoyed the second cup just brought her. She begged the stewardess to stay, yet only faintly protested when told she had to go. Once again Pancha was alone when the chiming tinkle, four bells, told that ten o'clock had come, and then for a moment she turned cold again and shrank within her rugs and wraps, for Loring slowly and deliberately rose and looked toward her. Now he was coming. Now he would speak. Now he would demand of her to explain her part in the wicked thing that had happened.

She dreaded, yet she longed to say, for she had a story that she could eagerly tell--to him. For a moment her heart lay still, and then leaped and fluttered uncontrollably. Slowly the shadowy fellow-pa.s.senger had found his feet. Steadily he looked, as though straight at her, for nearly a minute, then as slowly and deliberately turned his back and walked away forward. When, nearly an hour later, the stewardess came to lead her below, and the purser and one of the ship's officers had both been to inquire if she felt better, and to tell her to be of good cheer, she'd be all right on the morrow and trolling for dolphin on the blue Pacific, though she saw Loring slowly pacing up and down, though twice he pa.s.sed so close to her that by stretching forth her tiny foot she could have checked or tripped him, not once again did she detect so much as a glance at her.

And yet, when a little later the stewardess tucked her in her white berth, and invented messages and inquiries from her prostrated aunt and cousins in neighboring staterooms, that designing woman wove a tale about the blue-eyed, silent officer pacing the lonely deck--how anxious he was to do something for the little invalid--how eagerly he had gone and ordered for her, and superintended the preparation of that dainty little supper--how he had bidden the stewardess to stay by her and soothe her, and was so deeply interested. High and low, rich and poor, they love romance, these tender hearts, and for that reason, doubtless, no reference did Madame Flores make of the five-dollar gold-piece that had found its way to her ready palm. "And he spoke Spanish beautifully, did the Senor Teniente," said Madame Flores, whereat did Pancha's heart begin to flutter anew, for that meant that he must have heard and understood her pleadings.

And so it happened that till long after midnight the child lay wide-eyed and awake, listening to that steady, measured tread upon the upper deck.