Emily's eyes were beautiful with delight. But the sight gave David no pleasure. In genuine distress, he shook his head.

"Emily," he said, "you're going to be awfully disappointed in me."

Emily's eyes closed as though they shied at some mental picture. But when she opened them they were bright, and her smile was kind and eager.

"No, I'm not," she protested; "only I want a husband with a career, and one who'll tell me to keep quiet when I try to run it for him."

"I've often wished you would," said David.

"Would what? Run your career for you?"

"No, keep quiet. Only it didn't seem polite to tell you so."

"Maybe I'd like you better," said Emily, "if you weren't so darned polite."

A week later, early in the spring of 1897, the unexpected happened, and David was promoted into the flying squadron. He now was a travelling salesman, with a rise in salary and a commission on orders. It was a step forward, but as going on the road meant absence from Emily, David was not elated. Nor did it satisfy Emily. It was not money she wanted. Her ambition for David could not be silenced with a raise in wages. She did not say this, but David knew that in him she still found something lacking, and when they said good-by they both were ill at ease and completely unhappy. Formerly, each day when Emily in passing David in the office said good-morning, she used to add the number of the days that still separated them from the vacation which also was to be their honeymoon. But, for the last month she had stopped counting the days—at least she did not count them aloud.

David did not ask her why this was so. He did not dare. And, sooner than learn the truth that she had decided not to marry him, or that she was even considering not marrying him, he asked no questions, but in ignorance of her present feelings set forth on his travels. Absence from Emily hurt just as much as he had feared it would. He missed her, needed her, longed for her. In numerous letters he told her so. But, owing to the frequency with which he moved, her letters never caught up with him. It was almost a relief. He did not care to think of what they might tell him.

The route assigned David took him through the South and kept him close to the Atlantic seaboard. In obtaining orders he was not unsuccessful, and at the end of the first month received from the firm a telegram of congratulation. This was of importance chiefly because it might please Emily. But he knew that in her eyes the great-great-grandson of Hiram Greene could not rest content with a telegram from Burdett and Sons. A year before she would have considered it a high honor, a cause for celebration. Now, he could see her press her pretty lips together and shake her pretty head. It was not enough. But how could he accomplish more. He began to hate his great-great-grandfather. He began to wish Hiram Greene had lived and died a bachelor.

And then Dame Fortune took David in hand and toyed with him and spanked him, and pelted and petted him, until finally she made him her favorite son. Dame Fortune went about this work in an abrupt and arbitrary manner.

On the night of the 1st of March, 1897, two trains were scheduled to leave the Union Station at Jacksonville at exactly the same minute, and they left exactly on time. As never before in the history of any Southern railroad has this miracle occurred, it shows that when Dame Fortune gets on the job she is omnipotent. She placed David on the train to Miami as the train he wanted drew out for Tampa, and an hour later, when the conductor looked at David's ticket, he pulled the bell-cord and dumped David over the side into the heart of a pine forest. If he walked back along the track for one mile, the conductor reassured him, he would find a flag station where at midnight he could flag a train going north. In an hour it would deliver him safely in Jacksonville.

There was a moon, but for the greater part of the time it was hidden by fitful, hurrying clouds, and, as David stumbled forward, at one moment he would see the rails like streaks of silver, and the next would be encompassed in a complete and bewildering darkness. He made his way from tie to tie only by feeling with his foot. After an hour he came to a shed. Whether it was or was not the flag station the conductor had in mind, he did not know, and he never did know. He was too tired, too hot, and too disgusted to proceed, and dropping his suit case he sat down under the open roof of the shed prepared to wait either for the train or daylight. So far as he could see, on every side of him stretched a swamp, silent, dismal, interminable. From its black water rose dead trees, naked of bark and hung with streamers of funereal moss. There was not a sound or sign of human habitation. The silence was the silence of the ocean at night David remembered the berth reserved for him on the train to Tampa and of the loathing with which he had considered placing himself between its sheets. But now how gladly would he welcome it! For, in the sleeping-car, ill-smelling, close, and stuffy, he at least would have been surrounded by fellow-sufferers of his own species. Here his companions were owls, water-snakes, and sleeping buzzards.

"I am alone," he told himself, "on a railroad embankment, entirely surrounded by alligators."

And then he found he was not alone.

In the darkness, illuminated by a match, not a hundred yards from him there flashed suddenly the face of a man. Then the match went out and the face with it. David noted that it had appeared at some height above the level of the swamp, at an elevation higher even than that of the embankment. It was as though the man had been sitting on the limb of a tree. David crossed the tracks and found that on the side of the embankment opposite the shed there was solid ground and what once had been a wharf. He advanced over this cautiously, and as he did so the clouds disappeared, and in the full light of the moon he saw a bayou broadening into a river, and made fast to the decayed and rotting wharf an ocean-going tug. It was from her deck that the man, in lighting his pipe, had shown his face. At the thought of a warm engine-room and the company of his fellow creatures, David's heart leaped with pleasure. He advanced quickly. And then something in the appearance of the tug, something mysterious, secretive, threatening, caused him to halt. No lights showed from her engine-room, cabin, or pilot-house. Her decks were empty. But, as was evidenced by the black smoke that rose from her funnel, she was awake and awake to some purpose. David stood uncertainly, questioning whether to make his presence known or return to the loneliness of the shed. The question was decided for him. He had not considered that standing in the moonlight he was a conspicuous figure. The planks of the wharf creaked and a man came toward him. As one who means to attack, or who fears attack, he approached warily. He wore high boots, riding breeches, and a sombrero. He was a little man, but his movements were alert and active. To David he seemed unnecessarily excited. He thrust himself close against David.

"Who the devil are you?" demanded the man from the tug. "How'd you get here?"

"I walked," said David.

"Walked?" the man snorted incredulously.

"I took the wrong train," explained David pleasantly. "They put me off about a mile below here. I walked back to this flag station. I'm going to wait here for the next train north."

The little man laughed mockingly.

"Oh, no you're not," he said. "If you walked here, you can just walk away again!" With a sweep of his arm, he made a vigorous and peremptory gesture.

"You walk!" he commanded.

"I'll do just as I please about that," said David.

As though to bring assistance, the little man started hastily toward the tug.

"I'll find some one who'll make you walk!" he called. "You WAIT, that's all, you WAIT!"

David decided not to wait. It was possible the wharf was private property and he had been trespassing. In any case, at the flag station the rights of all men were equal, and if he were in for a fight he judged it best to choose his own battle-ground. He recrossed the tracks and sat down on his suit case in a dark corner of the shed. Himself hidden in the shadows he could see in the moonlight the approach of any other person.

"They're river pirates," said David to himself, "or smugglers. They're certainly up to some mischief, or why should they object to the presence of a perfectly harmless stranger?"

Partly with cold, partly with nervousness, David shivered.

"I wish that train would come," he sighed. And instantly? as though in answer to his wish, from only a short distance down the track he heard the rumble and creak of approaching cars. In a flash David planned his course of action.

The thought of spending the night in a swamp infested by alligators and smugglers had become intolerable. He must escape, and he must escape by the train now approaching. To that end the train must be stopped. His plan was simple. The train was moving very, very slowly, and though he had no lantern to wave, in order to bring it to a halt he need only stand on the track exposed to the glare of the headlight and wave his arms. David sprang between the rails and gesticulated wildly. But in amazement his arms fell to his sides. For the train, now only a hundred yards distant and creeping toward him at a snail's pace, carried no head-light, and though in the moonlight David was plainly visible, it blew no whistle, tolled no bell. Even the passenger coaches in the rear of the sightless engine were wrapped in darkness. It was a ghost of a train, a Flying Dutchman of a train, a nightmare of a train. It was as unreal as the black swamp, as the moss on the dead trees, as the ghostly tug-boat tied to the rotting wharf.

"Is the place haunted!" exclaimed David.

He was answered by the grinding of brakes and by the train coming to a sharp halt. And instantly from every side men fell from it to the ground, and the silence of the night was broken by a confusion of calls and eager greeting and questions and sharp words of command.

So fascinated was David in the stealthy arrival of the train and in her mysterious passengers that, until they confronted him, he did not note the equally stealthy approach of three men. Of these one was the little man from the tug. With him was a fat, red-faced Irish-American He wore no coat and his shirt-sleeves were drawn away from his hands by garters of pink elastic, his derby hat was balanced behind his ears, upon his right hand flashed an enormous diamond. He looked as though but at that moment he had stopped sliding glasses across a Bowery bar. The third man carried the outward marks of a sailor. David believed he was the tallest man he had ever beheld, but equally remarkable with his height was his beard and hair, which were of a fierce brick-dust red. Even in the mild moonlight it flamed like a torch.

"What's your business?" demanded the man with the flamboyant hair.

"I came here," began David, "to wait for a train—"

The tall man bellowed with indignant rage.

"Yes," he shouted; "this is the sort of place any one would pick out to wait for a train!"

In front of David's nose he shook a fist as large as a catcher's glove. "Don't you lie to ME!" he bullied. "Do you know who I am? Do you know WHO you're up against? I'm—"

The barkeeper person interrupted.

"Never mind who you are," he said. "We know that. Find out who HE is."

David turned appealingly to the barkeeper.

"Do you suppose I'd come here on purpose?" he protested. "I'm a travelling man—"

"You won't travel any to-night," mocked the red-haired one. "You've seen what you came to see, and all you want now is to get to a Western Union wire. Well, you don't do it. You don't leave here to-night!"

As though he thought he had been neglected, the little man in riding-boots pushed forward importantly.

"Tie him to a tree!" he suggested.

"Better take him on board," said the barkeeper, "and send him back by the pilot. When we're once at sea, he can't hurt us any."

"What makes you think I want to hurt you?" demanded David. "Who do you think I am?"

"We know who you are," shouted the fiery-headed one. "You're a blanketty-blank spy! You're a government spy or a Spanish spy, and whichever you are you don't get away to-night!"

David had not the faintest idea what the man meant, but he knew his self-respect was being ill-treated, and his self-respect rebelled.

"You have made a very serious mistake," he said, "and whether you like it or not, I AM leaving here to-night, and YOU can go to the devil!"

Turning his back David started with great dignity to walk away. It was a short walk. Something hit him below the ear and he found himself curling up comfortably on the ties. He had a strong desire to sleep, but was conscious that a bed on a railroad track, on account of trains wanting to pass, was unsafe. This doubt did not long disturb him. His head rolled against the steel rail, his limbs relaxed. From a great distance, and in a strange sing-song he heard the voice of the barkeeper saying, "Nine—ten—and OUT!"

When David came to his senses his head was resting on a coil of rope. In his ears was the steady throb of an engine, and in his eyes the glare of a lantern. The lantern was held by a pleasant-faced youth in a golf cap who was smiling sympathetically. David rose on his elbow and gazed wildly about him. He was in the bow of the ocean-going tug, and he saw that from where he lay in the bow to her stern her decks were packed with men. She was steaming swiftly down a broad river. On either side the gray light that comes before the dawn showed low banks studded with stunted palmettos. Close ahead David heard the roar of the surf.

"Sorry to disturb you," said the youth in the golf cap, "but we drop the pilot in a few minutes and you're going with him."

David moved his aching head gingerly, and was conscious of a bump as large as a tennis ball behind his right ear.

"What happened to me?" he demanded.

"You were sort of kidnapped, I guess," laughed the young man. "It was a raw deal, but they couldn't take any chances. The pilot will land you at Okra Point. You can hire a rig there to take you to the railroad."

"But why?" demanded David indignantly. "Why was I kidnapped? What had I done? Who were those men who—"

From the pilot-house there was a sharp jangle of bells to the engine-room, and the speed of the tug slackened.

"Come on," commanded the young man briskly. "The pilot's going ashore. Here's your grip, here's your hat. The ladder's on the port side. Look where you're stepping. We can't show any lights, and it's dark as—"

But, even as he spoke, like a flash of powder, as swiftly as one throws an electric switch, as blindingly as a train leaps from the tunnel into the glaring sun, the darkness vanished and the tug was swept by the fierce, blatant radiance of a search-light.

It was met by shrieks from two hundred throats, by screams, oaths, prayers, by the sharp jangling of bells, by the blind rush of many men scurrying like rats for a hole to hide in, by the ringing orders of one man. Above the tumult this one voice rose like the warning strokes of a fire-gong, and looking up to the pilot-house from whence the voice came, David saw the barkeeper still in his shirt-sleeves and with his derby hat pushed back behind his ears, with one hand clutching the telegraph to the engine-room, with the other holding the spoke of the wheel.

David felt the tug, like a hunter taking a fence, rise in a great leap. Her bow sank and rose, tossing the water from her in black, oily waves, the smoke poured from her funnel, from below her engines sobbed and quivered, and like a hound freed from a leash she raced for the open sea. But swiftly as she fled, as a thief is held in the circle of a policeman's bull's-eye, the shaft of light followed and exposed her and held her in its grip. The youth in the golf cap was clutching David by the arm. With his free hand he pointed down the shaft of light. So great was the tumult that to be heard he brought his lips close to David's ear.

"That's the revenue cutter!" he shouted. "She's been laying for us for three weeks, and now," he shrieked exultingly, "the old man's going to give her a race for it."

From excitement, from cold, from alarm, David's nerves were getting beyond his control.

"But how," he demanded, "how do I get ashore?"

"You don't!"

"When he drops the pilot, don't I—"

"How can he drop the pilot?" yelled the youth. "The pilot's got to stick by the boat. So have you."

David clutched the young man and swung him so that they stood face to face.

"Stick by what boat?" yelled David. "Who are these men? Who are you? What boat is this?"

In the glare of the search-light David saw the eyes of the youth staring at him as though he feared he were in the clutch of a madman. Wrenching himself free, the youth pointed at the pilot-house. Above it on a blue board in letters of gold-leaf a foot high was the name of the tug. As David read it his breath left him, a finger of ice passed slowly down his spine. The name he read was The Three Friends.

"THE THREE FRIENDS!" shrieked David. "She's a filibuster! She's a pirate! Where're we going?

"To Cuba!"

David emitted a howl of anguish, rage, and protest.

"What for?" he shrieked.

The young man regarded him coldly.

"To pick bananas," he said.

"I won't go to Cuba," shouted David. "I've got to work! I'm paid to sell machinery. I demand to be put ashore. I'll lose my job if I'm not put ashore. I'll sue you! I'll have the law—"

David found himself suddenly upon his knees. His first thought was that the ship had struck a rock, and then that she was bumping herself over a succession of coral reefs. She dipped, dived, reared, and plunged. Like a hooked fish, she flung herself in the air, quivering from bow to stern. No longer was David of a mind to sue the filibusters if they did not put him ashore. If only they had put him ashore, in gratitude he would have crawled on his knees. What followed was of no interest to David, nor to many of the filibusters, nor to any of the Cuban patriots. Their groans of self-pity, their prayers and curses in eloquent Spanish, rose high above the crash of broken crockery and the pounding of the waves. Even when the search-light gave way to a brilliant sunlight the circumstance was unobserved by David. Nor was he concerned in the tidings brought forward by the youth in the golf cap, who raced the slippery decks and vaulted the prostrate forms as sure-footedly as a hurdler on a cinder track. To David, in whom he seemed to think he had found a congenial spirit, he shouted Joyfully, "She's fired two blanks at us!" he cried; "now she's firing cannon-balls!"

"Thank God," whispered David; "perhaps she'll sink us!"

But The Three Friends showed her heels to the revenue cutter, and so far as David knew hours passed into days and days into weeks. It was like those nightmares in which in a minute one is whirled through centuries of fear and torment. Sometimes, regardless of nausea, of his aching head, of the hard deck, of the waves that splashed and smothered him, David fell into broken slumber. Sometimes he woke to a dull consciousness of his position. At such moments he added to his misery by speculating upon the other misfortunes that might have befallen him on shore. Emily, he decided, had given him up for lost and married—probably a navy officer in command of a battle-ship. Burdett and Sons had cast him off forever. Possibly his disappearance had caused them to suspect him; even now they might be regarding him as a defaulter, as a fugitive from justice. His accounts, no doubt, were being carefully overhauled. In actual time, two days and two nights had passed; to David it seemed many ages.

On the third day he crawled to the stern, where there seemed less motion, and finding a boat's cushion threw it in the lee scupper and fell upon it. From time to time the youth in the golf cap had brought him food and drink, and he now appeared from the cook's galley bearing a bowl of smoking soup.

David considered it a doubtful attention.

But he said, "You're very kind. How did a fellow like you come to mix up with these pirates?"

The youth laughed good-naturedly.

"They're not pirates, they're patriots," he said, "and I'm not mixed up with them. My name is Henry Carr and I'm a guest of Jimmy Doyle, the captain."

"The barkeeper with the derby hat?" said David.

"He's not a barkeeper, he's a teetotaler," Carr corrected, "and he's the greatest filibuster alive. He knows these waters as you know Broadway, and he's the salt of the earth. I did him a favor once; sort of mouse-helping-the-lion idea. Just through dumb luck I found out about this expedition. The government agents in New York found out I'd found out and sent for me to tell. But I didn't, and I didn't write the story either. Doyle heard about that. So, he asked me to come as his guest, and he's promised that after he's landed the expedition and the arms I can write as much about it as I darn please."

"Then you're a reporter?" said David.

"I'm what we call a cub reporter," laughed Carr. "You see, I've always dreamed of being a war correspondent. The men in the office say I dream too much. They're always guying me about it. But, haven't you noticed, it's the ones who dream who find their dreams come true. Now this isn't real war, but it's a near war, and when the real thing breaks loose, I can tell the managing editor I served as a war correspondent in the Cuban-Spanish campaign. And he may give me a real job!"

"And you LIKE this?" groaned David.

"I wouldn't, if I were as sick as you are," said Carr, "but I've a stomach like a Harlem goat." He stooped and lowered his voice. "Now, here are two fake filibusters," he whispered. "The men you read about in the newspapers. If a man's a REAL filibuster, nobody knows it!"

Coming toward them was the tall man who had knocked David out, and the little one who had wanted to tie him to a tree.

"All they ask," whispered Carr, "is money and advertisement. If they knew I was a reporter, they'd eat out of my hand. The tall man calls himself Lighthouse Harry. He once kept a light-house on the Florida coast, and that's as near to the sea as he ever got. The other one is a dare-devil calling himself Colonel Beamish. He says he's an English officer, and a soldier of fortune, and that he's been in eighteen battles. Jimmy says he's never been near enough to a battle to see the red-cross flags on the base hospital. But they've fooled these Cubans. The Junta thinks they're great fighters, and it's sent them down here to work the machine guns. But I'm afraid the only fighting they will do will be in the sporting columns, and not in the ring."

A half dozen sea-sick Cubans were carrying a heavy, oblong box. They dropped it not two yards from where David lay, and with a screwdriver Lighthouse Harry proceeded to open the lid.

Carr explained to David that The Three Friends was approaching that part of the coast of Cuba on which she had arranged to land her expedition, and that in case she was surprised by one of the Spanish patrol boats she was preparing to defend herself.

"They've got an automatic gun in that crate," said Carr, "and they're going to assemble it. You'd better move; they'll be tramping all over you."

David shook his head feebly.

"I can't move!" he protested. "I wouldn't move if it would free Cuba."

For several hours with very languid interest David watched Lighthouse Harry and Colonel Beamish screw a heavy tripod to the deck and balance above it a quick-firing one-pounder. They worked very slowly, and to David, watching them from the lee scupper, they appeared extremely unintelligent.

"I don't believe either of those thugs put an automatic gun together in his life," he whispered to Carr. "I never did, either, but I've put hundreds of automatic punches together, and I bet that gun won't work."

"What's wrong with it?" said Carr.

Before David could summon sufficient energy to answer, the attention of all on board was diverted, and by a single word.

Whether the word is whispered apologetically by the smoking-room steward to those deep in bridge, or shrieked from the tops of a sinking ship it never quite fails of its effect. A sweating stoker from the engine-room saw it first.

"Land!" he hailed.

The sea-sick Cubans raised themselves and swung their hats; their voices rose in a fierce chorus.

"Cuba libre!" they yelled.

The sun piercing the morning mists had uncovered a coast-line broken with bays and inlets. Above it towered green hills, the peak of each topped by a squat blockhouse; in the valleys and water courses like columns of marble rose the royal palms.

"You MUST look!" Carr entreated David, "it's just as it is in the pictures!

"Then I don't have to look," groaned David.

The Three Friends was making for a point of land that curved like a sickle. On the inside of the sickle was Nipe Bay. On the opposite shore of that broad harbor at the place of rendezvous a little band of Cubans waited to receive the filibusters. The goal was in sight. The dreadful voyage was done. Joy and excitement thrilled the ship's company. Cuban patriots appeared in uniforms with Cuban flags pinned in the brims of their straw sombreros. From the hold came boxes of small-arm ammunition of Mausers, rifles, machetes, and saddles. To protect the landing a box of shells was placed in readiness beside the one-pounder.

"In two hours, if we have smooth water," shouted Lighthouse Harry, "we ought to get all of this on shore. And then, all I ask," he cried mightily, "is for some one to kindly show me a Spaniard!"

His heart's desire was instantly granted. He was shown not only one Spaniard, but several Spaniards. They were on the deck of one of the fastest gun-boats of the Spanish navy. Not a mile from The Three Friends she sprang from the cover of a narrow inlet. She did not signal questions or extend courtesies. For her the name of the ocean-going tug was sufficient introduction. Throwing ahead of her a solid shell, she raced in pursuit, and as The Three Friends leaped to full speed there came from the gun-boat the sharp dry crackle of Mausers.

With an explosion of terrifying oaths Lighthouse Harry thrust a shell into the breech of the quick-firing gun. Without waiting to aim it, he tugged at the trigger. Nothing happened! He threw open the breech and gazed impotently at the base of the shell. It was untouched. The ship was ringing with cries of anger, of hate, with rat-like squeaks of fear.

Above the heads of the filibusters a shell screamed and within a hundred feet splashed into a wave.

From his mat in the lee scupper David groaned miserably. He was far removed from any of the greater emotions.

"It's no use!" he protested. "They can't do! It's not connected!"

"WHAT'S not connected?" yelled Carr. He fell upon David. He half-lifted, half-dragged him to his feet.

"If you know what's wrong with that gun, you fix it! Fix it," he shouted, "or I'll—"

David was not concerned with the vengeance Carr threatened. For, on the instant a miracle had taken place. With the swift insidiousness of morphine, peace ran through his veins, soothed his racked body, his jangled nerves. The Three Friends had made the harbor, and was gliding through water flat as a pond. But David did not know why the change had come. He knew only that his soul and body were at rest, that the sun was shining, that he had passed through the valley of the shadow, and once more was a sane, sound young man.

With a savage thrust of the shoulder he sent Lighthouse Harry sprawling from the gun. With swift, practised fingers he fell upon its mechanism. He wrenched it apart. He lifted it, reset, readjusted it.

Ignorant themselves, those about him saw that he understood, saw that his work was good.

They raised a joyous, defiant cheer. But a shower of bullets drove them to cover, bullets that ripped the deck, splintered the superstructure, smashed the glass in the air ports, like angry wasps sang in a continuous whining chorus. Intent only on the gun, David worked feverishly. He swung to the breech, locked it, and dragged it open, pulled on the trigger and found it gave before his forefinger.

He shouted with delight.

"I've got it working," he yelled.

He turned to his audience, but his audience had fled. From beneath one of the life-boats protruded the riding-boots of Colonel Beamish, the tall form of Lighthouse Harry was doubled behind a water butt. A shell splashed to port, a shell splashed to starboard. For an instant David stood staring wide-eyed at the greyhound of a boat that ate up the distance between them, at the jets of smoke and stabs of flame that sprang from her bow, at the figures crouched behind her gunwale, firing in volleys.

To David it came suddenly, convincingly, that in a dream he had lived it all before, and something like raw poison stirred in David, something leaped to his throat and choked him, something rose in his brain and made him see scarlet. He felt rather than saw young Carr kneeling at the box of ammunition, and holding a shell toward him. He heard the click as the breech shut, felt the rubber tire of the brace give against the weight of his shoulder, down a long shining tube saw the pursuing gun-boat, saw her again and many times disappear behind a flash of flame. A bullet gashed his forehead, a bullet passed deftly through his forearm, but he did not heed them. Confused with the thrashing of the engines, with the roar of the gun he heard a strange voice shrieking unceasingly:

"Cuba libre!" it yelled. "To hell with Spain!" and he found that the voice was his own.

The story lost nothing in the way Carr wrote it.

"And the best of it is," he exclaimed joyfully, "it's true!"

For a Spanish gun-boat HAD been crippled and forced to run herself aground by a tug-boat manned by Cuban patriots, and by a single gun served by one man, and that man an American. It was the first sea-fight of the war. Over night a Cuban navy had been born, and into the limelight a cub reporter had projected a new "hero," a ready-made, warranted-not-to-run, popular idol.

They were seated in the pilot-house, "Jimmy" Doyle, Carr, and David, the patriots and their arms had been safely dumped upon the coast of Cuba, and The Three Friends was gliding swiftly and, having caught the Florida straits napping, smoothly toward Key West. Carr had just finished reading aloud his account of the engagement.

"You will tell the story just as I have written it," commanded the proud author. "Your being South as a travelling salesman was only a blind. You came to volunteer for this expedition. Before you could explain your wish you were mistaken for a secret-service man, and hustled on board. That was just where you wanted to be, and when the moment arrived you took command of the ship and single-handed won the naval battle of Nipe Bay."

Jimmy Doyle nodded his head approvingly. "You certainty did, Dave," protested the great man, "I seen you when you done it!"

At Key West Carr filed his story and while the hospital surgeons kept David there over one steamer, to dress his wounds, his fame and features spread across the map of the United States.

Burdett and Sons basked in reflected glory. Reporters besieged their office. At the Merchants Down-Town Club the business men of lower Broadway tendered congratulations.

"Of course, it's a great surprise to us," Burdett and Sons would protest and wink heavily. "Of course, when the boy asked to be sent South we'd no idea he was planning to fight for Cuba! Or we wouldn't have let him go, would we?" Then again they would wink heavily. "I suppose you know," they would say, "that he's a direct descendant of General Hiram Greene, who won the battle of Trenton. What I say is, 'Blood will tell!'" And then in a body every one in the club would move against the bar and exclaim: "Here's to Cuba libre!"

When the Olivette from Key West reached Tampa Bay every Cuban in the Tampa cigar factories was at the dock. There were thousands of them and all of the Junta, in high hats, to read David an address of welcome.

And, when they saw him at the top of the gang-plank with his head in a bandage and his arm in a sling, like a mob of maniacs they howled and surged toward him. But before they could reach their hero the courteous Junta forced them back, and cleared a pathway for a young girl. She was travel-worn and pale, her shirt-waist was disgracefully wrinkled, her best hat was a wreck. No one on Broadway would have recognized her as Burdett and Sons' most immaculate and beautiful stenographer.

She dug the shapeless hat into David's shoulder, and clung to him. "David!" she sobbed, "promise me you'll never, never do it again!"



Chapter 5. THE SAILORMAN

Before Latimer put him on watch, the Nantucket sailorman had not a care in the world. If the wind blew from the north, he spun to the left; if it came from the south, he spun to the right. But it was entirely the wind that was responsible. So, whichever way he turned, he smiled broadly, happily. His outlook upon the world was that of one who loved his fellowman. He had many brothers as like him as twins all over Nantucket and Cape Cod and the North Shore, smiling from the railings of verandas, from the roofs of bungalows, from the eaves of summer palaces. Empaled on their little iron uprights, each sailorman whirled—sometimes languidly, like a great lady revolving to the slow measures of a waltz, sometimes so rapidly that he made you quite dizzy, and had he not been a sailorman with a heart of oak and a head and stomach of pine, he would have been quite seasick. But the particular sailorman that Latimer bought for Helen Page and put on sentry duty carried on his shoulders most grave and unusual responsibilities. He was the guardian of a buried treasure, the keeper of the happiness of two young people. It was really asking a great deal of a care-free, happy-go-lucky weather-vane.

Every summer from Boston Helen Page's people had been coming to Fair Harbor. They knew it when what now is the polo field was their cow pasture. And whether at the age of twelve or of twenty or more, Helen Page ruled Fair Harbor. When she arrived the "season" opened; when she departed the local trades-people sighed and began to take account of stock. She was so popular because she possessed charm, and because she played no favorites. To the grooms who held the ponies on the sidelines her manner was just as simple and interested as it was to the gilded youths who came to win the championship cups and remained to try to win Helen. She was just as genuinely pleased to make a four at tennis with the "kids" as to take tea on the veranda of the club-house with the matrons. To each her manner was always as though she were of their age. When she met the latter on the beach road, she greeted them riotously and joyfully by their maiden names. And the matrons liked it. In comparison the deference shown them by the other young women did not so strongly appeal.

"When I'm jogging along in my station wagon," said one of them, "and Helen shrieks and waves at me from her car, I feel as though I were twenty, and I believe that she is really sorry I am not sitting beside her, instead of that good-looking Latimer man, who never wears a hat. Why does he never wear a hat? Because he knows he's good-looking, or because Helen drives so fast he can't keep it on?"

"Does he wear a hat when he is not with Helen?" asked the new arrival. "That might help some."

"We will never know," exclaimed the young matron; "he never leaves her."

This was so true that it had become a public scandal. You met them so many times a day driving together, motoring together, playing golf together, that you were embarrassed for them and did not know which way to look. But they gloried in their shame. If you tactfully pretended not to see them, Helen shouted at you. She made you feel you had been caught doing something indelicate and underhand.

The mothers of Fair Harbor were rather slow in accepting young Latimer. So many of their sons had seen Helen shake her head in that inarticulate, worried way, and look so sorry for them, that any strange young man who apparently succeeded where those who had been her friends for years had learned they must remain friends, could not hope to escape criticism. Besides, they did not know him: he did not come from Boston and Harvard, but from a Western city. They were told that at home, at both the law and the game of politics, he worked hard and successfully; but it was rather held against him by the youth of Fair Harbor that he played at there games, not so much for the sake of the game as for exercise. He put aside many things, such as whiskey and soda at two in the morning, and bridge all afternoon, with the remark: "I find it does not tend toward efficiency." It was a remark that irritated and, to the minds of the men at the country clubs, seemed to place him. They liked to play polo because they liked to play polo, not because it kept their muscles limber and their brains clear.

"Some Western people were telling me," said one of the matrons, "that he wants to be the next lieutenant-governor. They say he is very ambitious and very selfish."

"Any man is selfish," protested one who for years had attempted to marry Helen, "who wants to keep Helen to himself. But that he should wish to be a lieutenant-governor, too, is rather an anticlimax. It makes one lose sympathy."

Latimer went on his way without asking any sympathy. The companionship of Helen Page was quite sufficient. He had been working overtime and was treating himself to his first vacation in years—he was young—he was in love and he was very happy. Nor was there any question, either, that Helen Page was happy. Those who had known her since she was a child could not remember when she had not been happy, but these days she wore her joyousness with a difference. It was in her eyes, in her greetings to old friends: it showed itself hourly in courtesies and kindnesses. She was very kind to Latimer, too. She did not deceive him. She told him she liked better to be with him than with any one else,—it would have been difficult to deny to him what was apparent to an entire summer colony,—but she explained that that did not mean she would marry him. She announced this when the signs she knew made it seem necessary. She announced it in what was for her a roundabout way, by remarking suddenly that she did not intend to marry for several years.

This brought Latimer to his feet and called forth from him remarks so eloquent that Helen found it very difficult to keep her own. She as though she had been caught in an undertow and was being whirled out to sea. When, at last, she had regained her breath, only because Latimer had paused to catch his, she shook her head miserably.

"The trouble is," she complained, "there are so many think the same thing!"

"What do they think?" demanded Latimer.

"That they want to marry me."

Checked but not discouraged, Latimer attacked in force.

"I can quite believe that," he agreed, "but there's this important difference: no matter how much a man wants to marry you, he can't LOVE you as I do!"

"That's ANOTHER thing they think," sighed Helen.

"I'm sorry to be so unoriginal," snapped Latimer.

"PLEASE don't!" pleaded Helen. "I don't mean to be unfeeling. I'm not unfeeling. I'm only trying to be fair. If I don't seem to take it to heart, it's because I know it does no good. I can see how miserable a girl must be if she is loved by one man and can't make up her mind whether or not she wants to marry him. But when there's so many she just stops worrying; for she can't possibly marry them all."

"ALL!" exclaimed Latimer. "It is incredible that I have undervalued you, but may I ask how many there are?"

"I don't know," sighed Helen miserably. "There seems to be something about me that—"

"There is!" interrupted Latimer. "I've noticed it. You don't have to tell me about it. I know that the Helen Page habit is a damned difficult habit to break!"

It cannot be said that he made any violent effort to break it. At least, not one that was obvious to Fair Harbor or to Helen.

One of their favorite drives was through the pine woods to the point on which stood the lighthouse, and on one of these excursions they explored a forgotten wood road and came out upon a cliff. The cliff overlooked the sea, and below it was a jumble of rocks with which the waves played hide and seek. On many afternoons and mornings they returned to this place, and, while Latimer read to her, Helen would sit with her back to a tree and toss pine-cones into the water. Sometimes the poets whose works he read made love so charmingly that Latimer was most grateful to them for rendering such excellent first aid to the wounded, and into his voice he would throw all that feeling and music that from juries and mass meetings had dragged tears and cheers and votes.

But when his voice became so appealing that it no longer was possible for any woman to resist it, Helen would exclaim excitedly: "Please excuse me for interrupting, but there is a large spider—" and the spell was gone.

One day she exclaimed: "Oh!" and Latimer patiently lowered the "Oxford Book of Verse," and asked: "What is it, NOW?"

"I'm so sorry," Helen said, "but I can't help watching that Chapman boy; he's only got one reef in, and the next time he jibs he'll capsize, and he can't swim, and he'll drown. I told his mother only yesterday—"

"I haven't the least interest in the Chapman boy," said Latimer, "or in what you told his mother, or whether he drowns or not! I'm a drowning man myself!"

Helen shook her head firmly and reprovingly. "Men get over THAT kind of drowning," she said.

"Not THIS kind of man doesn't!" said Latimer. "And don't tell me," he cried indignantly, "that that's ANOTHER thing they all say."

"If one could only be sure!" sighed Helen. "If one could only be sure that you—that the right man would keep on caring after you marry him the way he says he cares before you marry him. If you could know that, it would help you a lot in making up your mind."

"There is only one way to find that out," said Latimer; "that is to marry him. I mean, of course," he corrected hastily, "to marry me."

One day, when on their way to the cliff at the end of the wood road, the man who makes the Nantucket sailor and peddles him passed through the village; and Latimer bought the sailorman and carried him to their hiding-place. There he fastened him to the lowest limb of one of the ancient pine-trees that helped to screen their hiding-place from the world. The limb reached out free of the other branches, and the wind caught the sailorman fairly and spun him like a dancing dervish. Then it tired of him, and went off to try to drown the Chapman boy, leaving the sailorman motionless with his arms outstretched, balancing in each hand a tiny oar and smiling happily.

"He has a friendly smile," said Helen; "I think he likes us."

"He is on guard," Latimer explained. "I put him there to warn us if any one approaches, and when we are not here, he is to frighten away trespassers. Do you understand?" he demanded of the sailorman. "Your duty is to protect this beautiful lady. So long as I love her you must guard this place. It is a life sentence. You are always on watch. You never sleep. You are her slave. She says you have a friendly smile. She wrongs you. It is a beseeching, abject, worshipping smile. I am sure when I look at her mine is equally idiotic. In fact, we are in many ways alike. I also am her slave. I also am devoted only to her service. And I never sleep, at least not since I met her."

From her throne among the pine needles Helen looked up at the sailorman and frowned.

"It is not a happy simile," she objected. "For one thing, a sailorman has a sweetheart in every port."

"Wait and see," said Latimer.

"And," continued the girl with some asperity, "if there is anything on earth that changes its mind as often as a weather-vane, that is less CERTAIN, less CONSTANT—"

"Constant?" Latimer laughed at her in open scorn. "You come back here," he challenged, "months from now, years from now, when the winds have beaten him, and the sun blistered him, and the snow frozen him, and you will find him smiling at you just as he is now, just as confidently, proudly, joyously, devotedly. Because those who are your slaves, those who love YOU, cannot come to any harm; only if you disown them, only if you drive them away!"

The sailorman, delighted at such beautiful language, threw himself about in a delirium of joy. His arms spun in their sockets like Indian clubs, his oars flashed in the sun, and his eyes and lips were fixed in one blissful, long-drawn-out, unalterable smile.

When the golden-rod turned gray, and the leaves red and yellow, and it was time for Latimer to return to his work in the West, he came to say good-by. But the best Helen could do to keep hope alive in him was to say that she was glad he cared. She added it was very helpful to think that a man such as he believed you were so fine a person, and during the coming winter she would try to be like the fine person he believed her to be, but which, she assured him, she was not.

Then he told her again she was the most wonderful being in the world, to which she said: "Oh, indeed no!" and then, as though he were giving her a cue, he said: "Good-by!" But she did not take up his cue, and they shook hands. He waited, hardly daring to breathe.

"Surely, now that the parting has come," he assured himself, "she will make some sign, she will give me a word, a look that will write 'total' under the hours we have spent together, that will help to carry me through the long winter."

But he held her hand so long and looked at her so hungrily that he really forced her to say: "Don't miss your train," which kind consideration for his comfort did not delight him as it should. Nor, indeed, later did she herself recall the remark with satisfaction.

With Latimer out of the way the other two hundred and forty-nine suitor attacked with renewed hope. Among other advantages they had over Latimer was that they were on the ground. They saw Helen daily, at dinners, dances, at the country clubs, in her own drawing-room. Like any sailor from the Charlestown Navy Yard and his sweetheart, they could walk beside her in the park and throw peanuts to the pigeons, and scratch dates and initials on the green benches; they could walk with her up one side of Commonwealth Avenue and down the south bank of the Charles, when the sun was gilding the dome of the State House, when the bridges were beginning to deck themselves with necklaces of lights. They had known her since they wore knickerbockers; and they shared many interests and friends in common; they talked the same language. Latimer could talk to her only in letters, for with her he shared no friends or interests, and he was forced to choose between telling her of his lawsuits and his efforts in politics or of his love. To write to her of his affairs seemed wasteful and impertinent, and of his love for her, after she had received what he told of it in silence, he was too proud to speak. So he wrote but seldom, and then only to say: "You know what I send you." Had he known it, his best letters were those he did not send. When in the morning mail Helen found his familiar handwriting, that seemed to stand out like the face of a friend in a crowd, she would pounce upon the letter, read it, and, assured of his love, would go on her way rejoicing. But when in the morning there was no letter, she wondered why, and all day she wondered why. And the next morning when again she was disappointed, her thoughts of Latimer and her doubts and speculations concerning him shut out every other interest. He became a perplexing, insistent problem. He was never out of her mind. And then he would spoil it all by writing her that he loved her and that of all the women in the world she was the only one. And, reassured upon that point, Helen happily and promptly would forget all about him.

But when she remembered him, although months had passed since she had seen him, she remembered him much more distinctly, much more gratefully, than that one of the two hundred and fifty with whom she had walked that same afternoon. Latimer could not know it, but of that anxious multitude he was first, and there was no second. At least Helen hoped, when she was ready to marry, she would love Latimer enough to want to marry him. But as yet she assured herself she did not want to marry any one. As she was, life was very satisfactory. Everybody loved her, everybody invited her to be of his party, or invited himself to join hers, and the object of each seemed to be to see that she enjoyed every hour of every day. Her nature was such that to make her happy was not difficult. Some of her devotees could do it by giving her a dance and letting her invite half of Boston, and her kid brother could do it by taking her to Cambridge to watch the team at practice.

She thought she was happy because she was free. As a matter of fact, she was happy because she loved some one and that particular some one loved her. Her being "free" was only her mistaken way of putting it. Had she thought she had lost Latimer and his love, she would have discovered that, so far from being free, she was bound hand and foot and heart and soul.

But she did not know that, and Latimer did not know that.

Meanwhile, from the branch of the tree in the sheltered, secret hiding-place that overlooked the ocean, the sailorman kept watch. The sun had blistered him, the storms had buffeted him, the snow had frozen upon his shoulders. But his loyalty never relaxed. He spun to the north, he spun to the south, and so rapidly did he scan the surrounding landscape that no one could hope to creep upon him unawares. Nor, indeed, did any one attempt to do so. Once a fox stole into the secret hiding-place, but the sailorman flapped his oars and frightened him away. He was always triumphant. To birds, to squirrels, to trespassing rabbits he was a thing of terror. Once, when the air was still, an impertinent crow perched on the very limb on which he stood, and with scornful, disapproving eyes surveyed his white trousers, his blue reefer, his red cheeks. But when the wind suddenly drove past them the sailorman sprang into action and the crow screamed in alarm and darted away. So, alone and with no one to come to his relief, the sailorman stood his watch. About him the branches bent with the snow, the icicles froze him into immobility, and in the tree-tops strange groanings filled him with alarms. But undaunted, month after month, alert and smiling, he waited the return of the beautiful lady and of the tall young man who had devoured her with such beseeching, unhappy eyes.

Latimer found that to love a woman like Helen Page as he loved her was the best thing that could come into his life. But to sit down and lament over the fact that she did not love him did not, to use his favorite expression, "tend toward efficiency." He removed from his sight the three pictures of her he had cut from illustrated papers, and ceased to write to her.

In his last letter he said: "I have told you how it is, and that is how it is always going to be. There never has been, there never can be any one but you. But my love is too precious, too sacred to be brought out every week in a letter and dangled before your eyes like an advertisement of a motor-car. It is too wonderful a thing to be cheapened, to be subjected to slights and silence. If ever you should want it, it is yours. It is here waiting. But you must tell me so. I have done everything a man can do to make you understand. But you do not want me or my love. And my love says to me: 'Don't send me there again to have the door shut in my face. Keep me with you to be your inspiration, to help you to live worthily.' And so it shall be."

When Helen read that letter she did not know what to do. She did not know how to answer it. Her first impression was that suddenly she had grown very old, and that some one had turned off the sun, and that in consequence the world had naturally grown cold and dark. She could not see why the two hundred and forty-nine expected her to keep on doing exactly the same things she had been doing with delight for six months, and indeed for the last six years. Why could they not see that no longer was there any pleasure in them? She would have written and told Latimer that she found she loved him very dearly if in her mind there had not arisen a fearful doubt. Suppose his letter was not quite honest? He said that he would always love her, but how could she now know that? Why might not this letter be only his way of withdrawing from a position which he wished to abandon, from which, perhaps, he was even glad to escape? Were this true, and she wrote and said all those things that were in her heart, that now she knew were true, might she not hold him to her against his will? The love that once he had for her might no longer exist, and if, in her turn, she told him she loved him and had always loved him, might he not in some mistaken spirit of chivalry feel it was his duty to pretend to care? Her cheeks burned at the thought. It was intolerable. She could not write that letter. And as day succeeded day, to do so became more difficult. And so she never wrote and was very unhappy. And Latimer was very unhappy. But he had his work, and Helen had none, and for her life became a game of putting little things together, like a picture puzzle, an hour here and an hour there, to make up each day. It was a dreary game.

From time to time she heard of him through the newspapers. For, in his own State, he was an "Insurgent" making a fight, the outcome of which was expected to show what might follow throughout the entire West. When he won his fight much more was written about him, and he became a national figure. In his own State the people hailed him as the next governor, promised him a seat in the Senate. To Helen this seemed to take him further out of her life. She wondered if now she held a place even in his thoughts.

At Fair Harbor the two hundred and forty-nine used to joke with her about her politician. Then they considered Latimer of importance only because Helen liked him. Now they discussed him impersonally and over her head, as though she were not present, as a power, an influence, as the leader and exponent of a new idea. They seemed to think she no longer could pretend to any peculiar claim upon him, that now he belonged to all of them.

Older men would say to her: "I hear you know Latimer? What sort of a man is he?"

Helen would not know what to tell them. She could not say he was a man who sat with his back to a pine-tree, reading from a book of verse, or halting to devour her with humble, entreating eyes.

She went South for the winter, the doctors deciding she was run down and needed the change. And with an unhappy laugh at her own expense she agreed in their diagnosis. She was indifferent as to where they sent her, for she knew wherever she went she must still force herself to go on putting one hour on top of another, until she had built up the inexorable and necessary twenty-four.

When she returned winter was departing, but reluctantly, and returning unexpectedly to cover the world with snow, to eclipse the thin spring sunshine with cheerless clouds. Helen took herself seriously to task. She assured herself it was weak-minded to rebel. The summer was coming and Fair Harbor with all its old delights was before her. She compelled herself to take heart, to accept the fact that, after all, the world is a pretty good place, and that to think only of the past, to live only on memories and regrets, was not only cowardly and selfish, but, as Latimer had already decided, did not tend toward efficiency.

Among the other rules of conduct that she imposed upon herself was not to think of Latimer. At least, not during the waking hours. Should she, as it sometimes happened, dream of him—should she imagine they were again seated among the pines, riding across the downs, or racing at fifty miles an hour through country roads, with the stone fences flying past, with the wind and the sun in their eyes, and in their hearts happiness and content—that would not be breaking her rule. If she dreamed of him, she could not be held responsible. She could only be grateful.

And then, just as she had banished him entirely from her mind, he came East. Not as once he had planned to come, only to see her, but with a blare of trumpets, at the command of many citizens, as the guest of three cities. He was to speak at public meetings, to confer with party leaders, to carry the war into the enemy's country. He was due to speak in Boston at Faneuil Hall on the first of May, and that same night to leave for the West, and three days before his coming Helen fled from the city. He had spoken his message to Philadelphia, he had spoken to New York, and for a week the papers had spoken only of him. And for that week, from the sight of his printed name, from sketches of him exhorting cheering mobs, from snap-shots of him on rear platforms leaning forward to grasp eager hands, Helen had shut her eyes. And that during the time he was actually in Boston she might spare herself further and more direct attacks upon her feelings she escaped to Fair Harbor, there to remain until, on the first of May at midnight, he again would pass out of her life, maybe forever. No one saw in her going any significance. Spring had come, and in preparation for the summer season the house at Fair Harbor must be opened and set in order, and the presence there of some one of the Page family was easily explained.

She made the three hours' run to Fair Harbor in her car, driving it herself, and as the familiar landfalls fell into place, she doubted if it would not have been wiser had she stayed away. For she found that the memories of more than twenty summers at Fair Harbor had been wiped out by those of one summer, by those of one man. The natives greeted her joyously: the boatmen, the fishermen, her own grooms and gardeners, the village postmaster, the oldest inhabitant. They welcomed her as though they were her vassals and she their queen. But it was the one man she had exiled from Fair Harbor who at every turn wrung her heart and caused her throat to tighten. She passed the cottage where he had lodged, and hundreds of years seemed to have gone since she used to wait for him in the street, blowing noisily on her automobile horn, calling derisively to his open windows. Wherever she turned Fair Harbor spoke of him. The golf-links; the bathing beach; the ugly corner in the main street where he always reminded her that it was better to go slow for ten seconds than to remain a long time dead; the old house on the stone wharf where the schooners made fast, which he intended to borrow for his honeymoon; the wooden trough where they always drew rein to water the ponies; the pond into which he had waded to bring her lilies.

On the second day of her stay she found she was passing these places purposely, that to do so she was going out of her way. They no longer distressed her, but gave her a strange comfort. They were old friends, who had known her in the days when she was rich in happiness.

But the secret hiding-place—their very own hiding-place, the opening among the pines that overhung the jumble of rocks and the sea—she could not bring herself to visit. And then, on the afternoon of the third day when she was driving alone toward the lighthouse, her pony, of his own accord, from force of habit, turned smartly into the wood road. And again from force of habit, before he reached the spot that overlooked the sea, he came to a full stop. There was no need to make him fast. For hours, stretching over many summer days, he had stood under those same branches patiently waiting.

On foot, her heart beating tremulously, stepping reverently, as one enters the aisle of some dim cathedral, Helen advanced into the sacred circle. And then she stood quite still. What she had expected to find there she could not have told, but it was gone. The place was unknown to her. She saw an opening among gloomy pines, empty, silent, unreal. No haunted house, no barren moor, no neglected graveyard ever spoke more poignantly, more mournfully, with such utter hopelessness. There was no sign of his or of her former presence. Across the open space something had passed its hand, and it had changed. What had been a trysting-place, a bower, a nest, had become a tomb. A tomb, she felt, for something that once had been brave, fine, and beautiful, but which now was dead. She had but one desire, to escape from the place, to put it away from her forever, to remember it, not as she now found it, but as first she had remembered it, and as now she must always remember It. She turned softly on tiptoe as one who has intruded on a shrine.

But before she could escape there came from the sea a sudden gust of wind that caught her by the skirts and drew her back, that set the branches tossing and swept the dead leaves racing about her ankles. And at the same instant from just above her head there beat upon the air a violent, joyous tattoo—a sound that was neither of the sea nor of the woods, a creaking, swiftly repeated sound, like the flutter of caged wings.

Helen turned in alarm and raised her eyes—and beheld the sailorman.

Tossing his arms in a delirious welcome, waltzing in a frenzy of joy, calling her back to him with wild beckonings, she saw him smiling down at her with the same radiant, beseeching, worshipping smile. In Helen's ears Latimer's commands to the sailorman rang as clearly as though Latimer stood before her and had just spoken. Only now they were no longer a jest; they were a vow, a promise, an oath of allegiance that brought to her peace, and pride, and happiness.

"So long as I love this beautiful lady," had been his foolish words, "you will guard this place. It is a life sentence!"

With one hand Helen Page dragged down the branch on which the sailorman stood, with the other she snatched him from his post of duty. With a joyous laugh that was a sob, she clutched the sailorman in both her hands and kissed the beseeching, worshipping smile.

An hour later her car, on its way to Boston, passed through Fair Harbor at a rate of speed that caused her chauffeur to pray between his chattering teeth that the first policeman would save their lives by landing them in jail.

At the wheel, her shoulders thrown forward, her eyes searching the dark places beyond the reach of the leaping head-lights Helen Page raced against time, against the minions of the law, against sudden death, to beat the midnight train out of Boston, to assure the man she loved of the one thing that could make his life worth living.

And close against her heart, buttoned tight beneath her great-coat, the sailorman smiled in the darkness, his long watch over, his soul at peace, his duty well performed.



Chapter 6. THE MIND READER

When Philip Endicott was at Harvard, he wrote stories of undergraduate life suggested by things that had happened to himself and to men he knew. Under the title of "Tales of the Yard" they were collected in book form, and sold surprisingly well. After he was graduated and became a reporter on the New York Republic, he wrote more stories, in each of which a reporter was the hero, and in which his failure or success in gathering news supplied the plot. These appeared first in the magazines, and later in a book under the title of "Tales of the Streets." They also were well received.

Then came to him the literary editor of the Republic, and said: "There are two kinds of men who succeed in writing fiction—men of genius and reporters. A reporter can describe a thing he has seen in such a way that he can make the reader see it, too. A man of genius can describe something he has never seen, or any one else for that matter, in such a way that the reader will exclaim: 'I have never committed a murder; but if I had, that's just the way I'd feel about it.' For instance, Kipling tells us how a Greek pirate, chained to the oar of a trireme, suffers; how a mother rejoices when her baby crawls across her breast. Kipling has never been a mother or a pirate, but he convinces you he knows how each of them feels. He can do that because he is a genius; you cannot do it because you are not. At college you wrote only of what you saw at college; and now that you are in the newspaper business all your tales are only of newspaper work. You merely report what you see. So, if you are doomed to write only of what you see, then the best thing for you to do is to see as many things as possible. You must see all kinds of life. You must progress. You must leave New York, and you had better go to London."

"But on the Republic," Endicott pointed out, "I get a salary. And in London I should have to sweep a crossing."

"Then," said the literary editor, "you could write a story about a man who swept a crossing."

It was not alone the literary editor's words of wisdom that had driven Philip to London. Helen Carey was in London, visiting the daughter of the American Ambassador; and, though Philip had known her only one winter, he loved her dearly. The great trouble was that he had no money, and that she possessed so much of it that, unless he could show some unusual quality of mind or character, his asking her to marry him, from his own point of view at least, was quite impossible. Of course, he knew that no one could love her as he did, that no one so truly wished for her happiness, or would try so devotedly to make her happy. But to him it did not seem possible that a girl could be happy with a man who was not able to pay for her home, or her clothes, or her food, who would have to borrow her purse if he wanted a new pair of gloves or a hair-cut. For Philip Endicott, while rich in birth and education and charm of manner, had no money at all. When, in May, he came from New York to lay siege to London and to the heart of Helen Carey he had with him, all told, fifteen hundred dollars. That was all he possessed in the world; and unless the magazines bought his stories there was no prospect of his getting any more.

Friends who knew London told him that, if you knew London well, it was easy to live comfortably there and to go about and even to entertain modestly on three sovereigns a day. So, at that rate, Philip calculated he could stay three months. But he found that to know London well enough to be able to live there on three sovereigns a day you had first to spend so many five-pound notes in getting acquainted with London that there were no sovereigns left. At the end of one month he had just enough money to buy him a second-class passage back to New York, and he was as far from Helen as ever.

Often he had read in stories and novels of men who were too poor to marry. And he had laughed at the idea. He had always said that when two people truly love each other it does not matter whether they have money or not. But when in London, with only a five-pound note, and face to face with the actual proposition of asking Helen Carey not only to marry him but to support him, he felt that money counted for more than he had supposed. He found money was many different things—it was self-respect, and proper pride, and private honors and independence. And, lacking these things, he felt he could ask no girl to marry him, certainly not one for whom he cared as he cared for Helen Carey. Besides, while he knew how he loved her, he had no knowledge whatsoever that she loved him. She always seemed extremely glad to see him; but that might be explained in different ways. It might be that what was in her heart for him was really a sort of "old home week" feeling; that to her it was a relief to see any one who spoke her own language, who did not need to have it explained when she was jesting, and who did not think when she was speaking in perfectly satisfactory phrases that she must be talking slang.

The Ambassador and his wife had been very kind to Endicott, and, as a friend of Helen's, had asked him often to dinner and had sent him cards for dances at which Helen was to be one of the belles and beauties. And Helen herself had been most kind, and had taken early morning walks with him in Hyde Park and through the National Galleries; and they had fed buns to the bears in the Zoo, and in doing so had laughed heartily. They thought it was because the bears were so ridiculous that they laughed. Later they appreciated that the reason they were happy was because they were together. Had the bear pit been empty, they still would have laughed.

On the evening of the thirty-first of May, Endicott had gone to bed with his ticket purchased for America and his last five-pound note to last him until the boat sailed. He was a miserable young man. He knew now that he loved Helen Carey in such a way that to put the ocean between them was liable to unseat his courage and his self-control. In London he could, each night, walk through Carlton House Terrace and, leaning against the iron rails of the Carlton Club, gaze up at her window. But, once on the other side of the ocean, that tender exercise must be abandoned. He must even consider her pursued by most attractive guardsmen, diplomats, and belted earls. He knew they could not love her as he did; he knew they could not love her for the reasons he loved her, because the fine and beautiful things in her that he saw and worshipped they did not seek, and so did not find. And yet, for lack of a few thousand dollars, he must remain silent, must put from him the best that ever came into his life, must waste the wonderful devotion he longed to give, must starve the love that he could never summon for any other woman.

On the thirty-first of May he went to sleep utterly and completely miserable. On the first of June he woke hopeless and unrefreshed.

And then the miracle came.

Prichard, the ex-butler who valeted all the young gentlemen in the house where Philip had taken chambers, brought him his breakfast. As he placed the eggs and muffins on the tables to Philip it seemed as though Prichard had said: "I am sorry he is leaving us. The next gentleman who takes these rooms may not be so open-handed. He never locked up his cigars or his whiskey. I wish he'd give me his old dress-coat. It fits me, except across the shoulders."

Philip stared hard at Prichard; but the lips of the valet had not moved. In surprise and bewilderment, Philip demanded:

"How do you know it fits? Have you tried it on?"

"I wouldn't take such a liberty," protested Prichard. "Not with any of our gentlemen's clothes."

"How did you know I was talking about clothes," demanded Philip. "You didn't say anything about clothes, did you?"

"No, sir, I did not; but you asked me, sir, and I—"

"Were you thinking of clothes?"

"Well, sir, you might say, in a way, that I was," answered the valet. "Seeing as you're leaving, sir, and they're not over-new, I thought..."

"It's mental telepathy," said Philip.

"I beg your pardon," exclaimed Prichard.

"You needn't wait," said Philip.

The coincidence puzzled him; but by the time he had read the morning papers he had forgotten about it, and it was not until he had emerged into the street that it was forcibly recalled. The street was crowded with people; and as Philip stepped in among them, It was as though every one at whom he looked began to talk aloud. Their lips did not move, nor did any sound issue from between them; but, without ceasing, broken phrases of thoughts came to him as clearly as when, in passing in a crowd, snatches of talk are carried to the ears. One man thought of his debts; another of the weather, and of what disaster it might bring to his silk hat; another planned his luncheon; another was rejoicing over a telegram he had but that moment received. To himself he kept repeating the words of the telegram—"No need to come, out of danger." To Philip the message came as clearly as though he were reading it from the folded slip of paper that the stranger clutched in his hand.

Confused and somewhat frightened, and in order that undisturbed he might consider what had befallen him, Philip sought refuge from the crowded street in the hallway of a building. His first thought was that for some unaccountable cause his brain for the moment was playing tricks with him, and he was inventing the phrases he seemed to hear, that he was attributing thoughts to others of which they were entirely innocent. But, whatever it was that had befallen him, he knew it was imperative that he should at once get at the meaning of it.

The hallway in which he stood opened from Bond Street up a flight of stairs to the studio of a fashionable photographer, and directly in front of the hallway a young woman of charming appearance had halted. Her glance was troubled, her manner ill at ease. To herself she kept repeating: "Did I tell Hudson to be here at a quarter to eleven, or a quarter past? Will she get the telephone message to bring the ruff? Without the ruff it would be absurd to be photographed. Without her ruff Mary Queen of Scots would look ridiculous!"

Although the young woman had spoken not a single word, although indeed she was biting impatiently at her lower lip, Philip had distinguished the words clearly. Or, if he had not distinguished them, he surely was going mad. It was a matter to be at once determined, and the young woman should determine it. He advanced boldly to her, and raised his hat.

"Pardon me," he said, "but I believe you are waiting for your maid Hudson?"

As though fearing an impertinence, the girl regarded him in silence.

"I only wish to make sure," continued Philip, "that you are she for whom I have a message. You have an appointment, I believe, to be photographed in fancy dress as Mary Queen of Scots?"

"Well?" assented the girl.

"And you telephoned Hudson," he continued, "to bring you your muff."

The girl exclaimed with vexation.

"Oh!" she protested; "I knew they'd get it wrong! Not muff, ruff! I want my ruff."

Philip felt a cold shiver creep down his spine.

"For the love of Heaven!" he exclaimed in horror; "it's true!"

"What's true?" demanded the young woman in some alarm.

"That I'm a mind reader," declared Philip. "I've read your mind! I can read everybody's mind. I know just what you're thinking now. You're thinking I'm mad!"

The actions of the young lady showed that again he was correct. With a gasp of terror she fled past him and raced up the stairs to the studio. Philip made no effort to follow and to explain. What was there to explain? How could he explain that which, to himself, was unbelievable? Besides, the girl had served her purpose. If he could read the mind of one, he could read the minds of all. By some unexplainable miracle, to his ordinary equipment of senses a sixth had been added. As easily as, before that morning, he could look into the face of a fellow-mortal, he now could look into the workings of that fellow-mortal's mind. The thought was appalling. It was like living with one's ear to a key-hole. In his dismay his first idea was to seek medical advice—the best in London. He turned instantly in the direction of Harley Street. There, he determined, to the most skilled alienist in town he would explain his strange plight. For only as a misfortune did the miracle appear to him. But as he made his way through the streets his pace slackened.

Was he wise, he asked himself, in allowing others to know he possessed this strange power? Would they not at once treat him as a madman? Might they not place him under observation, or even deprive him of his liberty? At the thought he came to an abrupt halt His own definition of the miracle as a "power" had opened a new line of speculation. If this strange gift (already he was beginning to consider it more leniently) were concealed from others, could he not honorably put it to some useful purpose? For, among the blind, the man with one eye is a god. Was not he—among all other men the only one able to read the minds of all other men—a god? Turning into Bruton Street, he paced its quiet length considering the possibilities that lay within him.

It was apparent that the gift would lead to countless embarrassments. If it were once known that he possessed it, would not even his friends avoid him? For how could any one, knowing his most secret thought was at the mercy of another, be happy in that other's presence? His power would lead to his social ostracism. Indeed, he could see that his gift might easily become a curse. He decided not to act hastily, that for the present he had best give no hint to others of his unique power.

As the idea of possessing this power became more familiar, he regarded it with less aversion. He began to consider to what advantage he could place it. He could see that, given the right time and the right man, he might learn secrets leading to far-reaching results. To a statesman, to a financier, such a gift as he possessed would make him a ruler of men. Philip had no desire to be a ruler of men; but he asked himself how could he bend this gift to serve his own? What he most wished was to marry Helen Carey; and, to that end, to possess money. So he must meet men who possessed money, who were making money. He would put questions to them. And with words they would give evasive answers; but their minds would tell him the truth.

The ethics of this procedure greatly disturbed him. Certainly it was no better than reading other people's letters. But, he argued, the dishonor in knowledge so obtained would lie only in the use he made of it. If he used it without harm to him from whom it was obtained and with benefit to others, was he not justified in trading on his superior equipment? He decided that each case must be considered separately in accordance with the principle involved. But, principle or no principle, he was determined to become rich. Did not the end justify the means? Certainly an all-wise Providence had not brought Helen Carey into his life only to take her away from him. It could not be so cruel. But, in selecting them for one another, the all-wise Providence had overlooked the fact that she was rich and he was poor. For that oversight Providence apparently was now endeavoring to make amends. In what certainly was a fantastic and roundabout manner Providence had tardily equipped him with a gift that could lead to great wealth. And who was he to fly in the face of Providence? He decided to set about building up a fortune, and building it in a hurry.

From Bruton Street he had emerged upon Berkeley Square; and, as Lady Woodcote had invited him to meet Helen at luncheon at the Ritz, he turned in that direction. He was too early for luncheon; but in the corridor of the Ritz he knew he would find persons of position and fortune, and in reading their minds he might pass the time before luncheon with entertainment, possibly with profit. For, while pacing Bruton Street trying to discover the principles of conduct that threatened to hamper his new power, he had found that in actual operation it was quite simple. He learned that his mind, in relation to other minds, was like the receiver of a wireless station with an unlimited field. For, while the wireless could receive messages only from those instruments with which it was attuned, his mind was in key with all other minds. To read the thoughts of another, he had only to concentrate his own upon that person; and to shut off the thoughts of that person, he had only to turn his own thoughts elsewhere. But also he discovered that over the thoughts of those outside the range of his physical sight he had no control. When he asked of what Helen Carey was at that moment thinking, there was no result. But when he asked, "Of what is that policeman on the corner thinking?" he was surprised to find that that officer of the law was formulating regulations to abolish the hobble skirt as an impediment to traffic.

As Philip turned into Berkeley Square, the accents of a mind in great distress smote upon his new and sixth sense. And, in the person of a young gentleman leaning against the park railing, he discovered the source from which the mental sufferings emanated. The young man was a pink-cheeked, yellow-haired youth of extremely boyish appearance, and dressed as if for the race-track. But at the moment his pink and babyish face wore an expression of complete misery. With tear-filled eyes he was gazing at a house of yellow stucco on the opposite side of the street. And his thoughts were these: "She is the best that ever lived, and I am the most ungrateful of fools. How happy were we in the house of yellow stucco! Only now, when she has closed its doors to me, do I know how happy! If she would give me another chance, never again would I distress or deceive her."

So far had the young man progressed in his thoughts when an automobile of surprising smartness swept around the corner and drew up in front of the house of yellow stucco, and from it descended a charming young person. She was of the Dresden-shepherdess type, with large blue eyes of haunting beauty and innocence.

"My wife!" exclaimed the blond youth at the railings. And instantly he dodged behind a horse that, while still attached to a four-wheeler, was contentedly eating from a nose-bag.

With a key the Dresden shepherdess opened the door to the yellow house and disappeared.

The calling of the reporter trains him in audacity, and to act quickly. He shares the troubles of so many people that to the troubles of other people he becomes callous, and often will rush in where friends of the family fear to tread. Although Philip was not now acting as a reporter, he acted quickly. Hardly had the door closed upon the young lady than he had mounted the steps and rung the visitor's bell. As he did so, he could not resist casting a triumphant glance in the direction of the outlawed husband. And, in turn, what the outcast husband, peering from across the back of the cab horse, thought of Philip, of his clothes, of his general appearance, and of the manner in which he would delight to alter all of them, was quickly communicated to the American. They were thoughts of a nature so violent and uncomplimentary that Philip hastily cut off all connection.

As Philip did not know the name of the Dresden-china doll, it was fortunate that on opening the door, the butler promptly announced:

"Her ladyship is not receiving."

"Her ladyship will, I think, receive me," said Philip pleasantly, "when you tell her I come as the special ambassador of his lordship."

From a tiny reception-room on the right of the entrance-hall there issued a feminine exclamation of surprise, not unmixed with joy; and in the hall the noble lady instantly appeared.

When she saw herself confronted by a stranger, she halted in embarrassment. But as, even while she halted, her only thought had been, "Oh! if he will only ask me to forgive him!" Philip felt no embarrassment whatsoever. Outside, concealed behind a cab horse, was the erring but bitterly repentant husband; inside, her tenderest thoughts racing tumultuously toward him, was an unhappy child-wife begging to be begged to pardon.

For a New York reporter, and a Harvard graduate of charm and good manners, it was too easy.

"I do not know you," said her ladyship. But even as she spoke she motioned to the butler to go away. "You must be one of his new friends." Her tone was one of envy.

"Indeed, I am his newest friend," Philip assured her; "but I can safely say no one knows his thoughts as well as I. And they are all of you!"

The china shepherdess blushed with happiness, but instantly she shook her head.

"They tell me I must not believe him," she announced. "They tell me—"

"Never mind what they tell you," commanded Philip. "Listen to ME. He loves you. Better than ever before, he loves you. All he asks is the chance to tell you so. You cannot help but believe him. Who can look at you, and not believe that he loves you! Let me," he begged, "bring him to you." He started from her when, remembering the somewhat violent thoughts of the youthful husband, he added hastily: "Or perhaps it would be better if you called him yourself."

"Called him!" exclaimed the lady. "He is in Paris-at the races—with her!"

"If they tell you that sort of thing," protested Philip indignantly, "you must listen to me. He is not in Paris. He is not with her. There never was a her!"

He drew aside the lace curtains and pointed. "He is there—behind that ancient cab horse, praying that you will let him tell you that not only did he never do it; but, what is much more important, he will never do it again."

The lady herself now timidly drew the curtains apart, and then more boldly showed herself upon the iron balcony. Leaning over the scarlet geraniums, she beckoned with both hands. The result was instantaneous. Philip bolted for the front door, leaving it open; and, as he darted down the steps, the youthful husband, in strides resembling those of an ostrich, shot past him. Philip did not cease running until he was well out of Berkeley Square. Then, not ill-pleased with the adventure, he turned and smiled back at the house of yellow stucco.

"Bless you, my children," he murmured; "bless you!"

He continued to the Ritz; and, on crossing Piccadilly to the quieter entrance to the hotel in Arlington Street, found gathered around it a considerable crowd drawn up on either side of a red carpet that stretched down the steps of the hotel to a court carriage. A red carpet in June, when all is dry under foot and the sun is shining gently, can mean only royalty; and in the rear of the men in the street Philip halted. He remembered that for a few days the young King of Asturia and the Queen Mother were at the Ritz incognito; and, as he never had seen the young man who so recently and so tragically had been exiled from his own kingdom, Philip raised himself on tiptoe and stared expectantly.

As easily as he could read their faces could he read the thoughts of those about him. They were thoughts of friendly curiosity, of pity for the exiles; on the part of the policemen who had hastened from a cross street, of pride at their temporary responsibility; on the part of the coachman of the court carriage, of speculation as to the possible amount of his Majesty's tip. The thoughts were as harmless and protecting as the warm sunshine.

And then, suddenly and harshly, like the stroke of a fire bell at midnight, the harmonious chorus of gentle, hospitable thoughts was shattered by one that was discordant, evil, menacing. It was the thought of a man with a brain diseased; and its purpose was murder.

"When they appear at the doorway," spoke the brain of the maniac, "I shall lift the bomb from my pocket. I shall raise it above my head. I shall crash it against the stone steps. It will hurl them and all of these people into eternity and me with them. But I shall LIVE—a martyr to the Cause. And the Cause will flourish!"

Through the unsuspecting crowd, like a football player diving for a tackle, Philip hurled himself upon a little dark man standing close to the open door of the court carriage. From the rear Philip seized him around the waist and locked his arms behind him, elbow to elbow. Philip's face, appearing over the man's shoulder, stared straight into that of the policeman.

"He has a bomb in his right-hand pocket!" yelled Philip. "I can hold him while you take it! But, for Heaven's sake, don't drop it!" Philip turned upon the crowd. "Run! all of you!" he shouted. "Run like the devil!"

At that instant the boy King and his Queen Mother, herself still young and beautiful, and cloaked with a dignity and sorrow that her robes of mourning could not intensify, appeared in the doorway.

"Go back, sir!" warned Philip. "He means to kill you!"

At the words and at sight of the struggling men, the great lady swayed helplessly, her eyes filled with terror. Her son sprang protectingly in front of her. But the danger was past. A second policeman was now holding the maniac by the wrists, forcing his arms above his head; Philip's arms, like a lariat, were wound around his chest; and from his pocket the first policeman gingerly drew forth a round, black object of the size of a glass fire-grenade. He held it high in the air, and waved his free hand warningly. But the warning was unobserved. There was no one remaining to observe it. Leaving the would-be assassin struggling and biting in the grasp of the stalwart policeman, and the other policeman unhappily holding the bomb at arm's length, Philip sought to escape into the Ritz. But the young King broke through the circle of attendants and stopped him.

"I must thank you," said the boy eagerly; "and I wish you to tell me how you came to suspect the man's purpose."

Unable to speak the truth, Philip, the would-be writer of fiction, began to improvise fluently.

"To learn their purpose, sir," he said, "is my business. I am of the International Police, and in the secret service of your Majesty."

"Then I must know your name," said the King, and added with a dignity that was most becoming, "You will find we are not ungrateful."

Philip smiled mysteriously and shook his head.

"I said in your secret service," he repeated. "Did even your Majesty know me, my usefulness would be at an end." He pointed toward the two policemen. "If you desire to be just, as well as gracious, those are the men to reward."

He slipped past the King and through the crowd of hotel officials into the hall and on into the corridor.

The arrest had taken place so quietly and so quickly that through the heavy glass doors no sound had penetrated, and of the fact that they had been so close to a possible tragedy those in the corridor were still ignorant. The members of the Hungarian orchestra were arranging their music; a waiter was serving two men of middle age with sherry; and two distinguished-looking elderly gentlemen seated together on a sofa were talking in leisurely whispers.

One of the two middle-aged men was well known to Philip, who as a reporter had often, in New York, endeavored to interview him on matters concerning the steel trust. His name was Faust. He was a Pennsylvania Dutchman from Pittsburgh, and at one time had been a foreman of the night shift in the same mills he now controlled. But with a roar and a spectacular flash, not unlike one of his own blast furnaces, he had soared to fame and fortune. He recognized Philip as one of the bright young men of the Republic; but in his own opinion he was far too self-important to betray that fact.

Philip sank into an imitation Louis Quatorze chair beside a fountain in imitation of one in the apartment of the Pompadour, and ordered what he knew would be an execrable imitation of an American cocktail. While waiting for the cocktail and Lady Woodcote's luncheon party, Philip, from where he sat, could not help but overhear the conversation of Faust and of the man with him. The latter was a German with Hebraic features and a pointed beard. In loud tones he was congratulating the American many-time millionaire on having that morning come into possession of a rare and valuable masterpiece, a hitherto unknown and but recently discovered portrait of Philip IV by Velasquez.

Philip sighed enviously.

"Fancy," he thought, "owning a Velasquez! Fancy having it all to yourself! It must be fun to be rich. It certainly is hell to be poor!"

The German, who was evidently a picture-dealer, was exclaiming in tones of rapture, and nodding his head with an air of awe and solemnity.

"I am telling you the truth, Mr. Faust," he said. "In no gallery in Europe, no, not even in the Prado, is there such another Velasquez. This is what you are doing, Mr. Faust, you are robbing Spain. You are robbing her of something worth more to her than Cuba. And I tell you, so soon as it is known that this Velasquez is going to your home in Pittsburgh, every Spaniard will hate you and every art-collector will hate you, too. For it is the most wonderful art treasure in Europe. And what a bargain, Mr. Faust! What a bargain!"