A twitching of Virginia's eyelids at that moment caught Sam's attention. It was nature's first harbinger of approaching consciousness. He held up his hand for Smith to be silent. The twitching, however, ceased, and her eyelid remaining closed, again became motionless.

"A false alarm!" he muttered, and proceeded to chafe her hands more industriously than before. It was evident that Sam liked the occupation; for this young lady had unconsciously woven a mesh of enthralling servitude about his heart, and his idolizing; pa.s.sionate fondness had at last been rewarded by unexpectedly finding himself permitted to caress her at will; to stroke her hair, to contemplate her fair face, to press her hands between his own.

Sam shrewdly suspected that Virginia was somehow the cause of Thorpe's estrangement from his wife, but wherefore and why, were parts that she alone could explain, and her lips were sealed.

That she was also mysteriously connected with the abduction of the child, he felt was a moral certainty. And her meeting with the Italian in the lonely park at dead of night could have offered no other solution. It had acted as a temporary restraining factor upon the ardor of his love and admiration. But now, as she lay so still and insensible in his care and protection; now, as he gazed on her fair features, all his doubts of her chast.i.ty and loyalty to those she loved vanished, and an all conquering fondness suddenly burst in a flood of radiance upon him, sweeping away all his misgivings before it, irresistible and impetuous as the flight of an avalanche.

It was very quiet at that moment; so still that the rippling water, as it lapped along the logs which supported the cabin, sounded very distinct. Smith imagined he heard a splash, and a.s.suming a listening att.i.tude, said cautiously, "Phwat may that mane?"

After a pause, Sam alertly remarked, "We have not kept a lookout. What if the dago's partner should steal in on us?"

Smith's eyes blazed with anger. Laying Constance's hand down, he sprang to his feet. "Be the power ave justice," he exclaimed between his teeth, "sure, an' it do be a divil ave a bad job the rogue'll take on, to boord us now."

"If you see anybody lurking near, call me," said Sam.

"Niver yees moind! Just lave the thavin' blackguard to me! I'll attind to him!" Smith answered, a savage joy betrayed on his face, and, seizing hold of the axe, he crept softly to the door. After listening a moment, he opened it and stepped out, closing the door behind him.

Again there was silence. Again Sam tenderly smoothed away Virginia's abundant silky black hair from her face, and fondly chafed her temples. And as he thought of her swift recovery, a recovery that would place a great gulf between him and this one girl who could make him the happiest being on all G.o.d's green earth, he muttered; "Oh, for one touch of those ruby colored lips--even if it be stolen."

Virginia's face was very close to him, and as he looked at her he detected a faint warmth in her cheeks; noted the fine mold, the delicate tracery of blue veins through her clear white skin--the temptation was very great. His heart thumped wildly and then--unmindful of the impropriety, or unwilling to resist the natural inclination of his arm to slip under her full, round, snowy neck--raised her head and touched her lips with his. The contact germinated a magnetic spark that raced through her veins and instantly awoke her to life.

She sprang to her feet, the red blood of active youth flushing her face to crimson. For one moment she looked indignant, fully conscious of the liberty he had taken. Sam bent his head abashed, and said apologetically--said in tones and manner that left no mistake as to his honest love and deep respect for her--"You looked so beautiful that--really now--I could not help it--forgive me!"

Her mobile face, that had set in a shock of alarm, indignation and scorn, softened and, as the events of the night flooded her memory, changed to a smile. For one moment it loitered in her eyes and on her lips, and then again changed to a grave, serious look that developed tears in her beautiful blue eyes. She held out her hand to him. Were his eyes deceiving him? Could he believe it? Yes, and he stood dazed with overpowering joy that she was not offended at the liberty.

He took her hand and gently carried it to his lips. Then she turned to the aid of Constance, knelt beside her, felt her hands, her face, her neck, and asked him. "Who was so mean to strike her down?"

For answer he sadly shook his head, and replied gravely, "She sank to the floor after John Thorpe refused her."

Then bitter tears trickled down Virginia's face as she continued to chafe her hands; but finding her efforts to restore warmth were unavailing, the same gripping at her heartstrings again possessed her.

She raised her eyes to him, a frantic pleading in her voice, "Help me, Sam; oh, help me bring back the life that has nearly fled!"

"Help you!" he repeated proudly, as he stood in front of the girl who had for the first time asked of him a favor in her distress, the favor of a "good samaritan."

And then, looking straight at her, he said, very seriously, as he knelt and took Constance's other hand, "The strength that G.o.d has given me is at your service, now and forever!"

She understood, and he noted with pleasure that no swift questioning glance of anger, no look of weariness and turning away, as once before, followed his magnanimity.

At that moment Smith, who stood on the platform just outside the cabin door, was heard to say in a loud voice:

"Move on there! The channel be over beyant, in the middle ave the water! Kape yees head more sout be aste!" Then he was heard muttering indistinctly, with only such disjointed words as "blackguard,"

"whillip" and "divilish rat," clearly audible.

It was soon, however, followed by angry words delivered in an aggressively belligerent voice: "Be hivins, don't yees come near us!

Kape off, sure, d'yees moind, yees blackguards, or I'll put a hole through yees bottom that'll sink yees down to the place where yees do belong, so ye do!"

Suddenly changing his voice to an anxious tone, said, "Phwat d'yees want? Phwat's that? Doctor, sure! Praise be to G.o.d! Oh, we've been waitin' for yees, doctor dear, till our hearts do be broken entirely.

Be me soul, it's the thruth; not wan bit more nor less. Come, dear, yees do be wanted quick!"

A lurch at the cabin told that the launch had arrived. The door was hastily opened and Smith pushed the doctor in.

"There they be, sure, lyin' en the flure wid no sinse in thim at all, at all. Do yees be quick, doctor, and hivin'll reward yees!"

Skillful application of proven restoratives, however, failed to produce sensibility, and the doctor considered the case so grave that he ordered Constance be removed to her home as quickly as possible.

She was, therefore, tenderly taken on board the launch and conveyed home.

The sun's rays had burst through and dispersed the early morning mists before Constance recovered from the shock, but, alas! with the shadow of a wreck enveloping her.

CHAPTER XVIII.

The next morning Sam determined upon a personal interview with the prisoner. Upon arrival at the County jail, where the prisoner had been transferred, Sam encountered Smith, who was standing on the curb talking to a policeman.

"How dy yus do, Sor?" was Smith's greeting.

"Getting along as fast as could be expected," he answered.

"It do be surprisin' the number ave blackguards there do be infesting the straits ove Portland after dark these days. Houldups, an'

'break-o-day Johnnies' an' 'shanghoin' an'--an' kidnappin'--an' what bates me, all the worrk to be had at good wages the while--whill wan ave the rogues do be off his bait for a time, so he do!"

"Sure, Smith, no mistake about that," Sam laughed. "We slipped it over him in fine shape last night. Have you seen him this morning?"

"Indade oi 'ave, Sor, and he's the very wan that run the soule ave his plexis ferninst me hand the other day for spakin' disrespectful ave a lady."

"I came to see him," Sam said, with a smile at Smith's chivalry.

"Indade! Sure yees'll not recognize him as the wan we tuk last night at all, fir the color ave hair do be turnin' from black to a faded straw, so it do."

"Through terror of his position, I suppose."

"Not wan bit, sor. It came out in the wash. It do be this way. Yees see, the orficers cudn't get him to spake wan worrd an' no sweatbox or other terror ave the force did he fear, at all, sure! So they turned the water on him, after takin' off his clothes with the aid of two 'trustys,' and it was raymarked by the jailer that his skin do look uncommon fair, an the hair on his limbs was a sandy color, an' not black, like the hair on his hid, and his mustache oily black, too, so it do."

"Artificial coloring," suggested Sam.

"Sure, that's jist phat the jailor sid, the very same worrds, although do yees naw the color blend av his nick from the color bone up was a beautiful bit of worrk, as nate an' natural as anything yees would want to see."

"He is possibly an Italian artist."

"Sure, he's no Italian at all, fir the trustys soaped an' lathered an'

scrubbed all the Dago off ave him. He raysisted loike a madman, but it was no use, and whin they held him under the shower bath his heavy black mustache fell off onto the floor. Wan ave the trustys picked it up and said, says he: 'By jimminy, he's no Dago at all; he's a scoogy.' An' I say so, too, so I do. And the jailer raymarked it was just as he expected, and then he tould them to get the scoogy into his duds."

"I will try and get permission to see him."

Sam then entered the office, followed by Smith. They were readily allowed to see the prisoner, and upon approaching his cell, Sam recognized him at once, and the Sheriff wrote on the record, opposite the name of George Golda--"Alias, Jack Sh.o.r.e."