"I know! Sole leather hat box and all, it goes by buckboard to your address at division headquarters. Our heads are about of the same caliber; the main difference is that yours seems loaded. The Alta says silk hats are now worn on sunny mornings. Sport mine for me, though it be of the vintage of a by-gone year. I shall not show my face in civilization till I have lived down my shame. So now for two years at least of Yuma and the consolation to be derived from the solitary study of philosophy and Shakespeare.
"Yours in meekness of spirit,
"Gerald Blake.
"P. S.—They say that Sancho's brother's real name is Escalante. If ever you come across one of that race keep your eyes peeled."
Another day and the billows of the gulf were breaking under the Idaho's counter and hissing sternward in snowy foam, answering the rush of a strong southwest wind. It was late at evening when the black hull went reeling in toward the lights of Guaymas, and the massive anchor, with prodigious splash dove for the sandy bottom, but late as it was the shore boats and lighters came pulling to the gangway stairs, and merchants, clerks and customs officers nimbly scrambled up the side, and then followed a number of passengers, cigarette smoking and cackling about the swarming deck, and Turnbull and the Engineer hung over the rail and watched for the promised boatload of beauty and presently it came. Two or three small boats were rowed alongside, and there were glimpses of shrouded forms and there were sounds of joyous laughter and murmured gallantries of dark-eyed, dark-skinned caballeros, and the growling injunctions of, presumably, paterfamilias. And presently the ladder-like stairs were cleared, and, one after another, woman after woman was assisted up the narrow way, and came sailing into the zone of light from the polished reflectors, elder women first, then slender, sparkling-eyed damsels whose white teeth gleamed as they chatted with their escorts. Two undeniably attractive, Spanish-looking girls were objects of most assiduous care. Then came a third, younger, a mere slip of a maid, with but a single cavalier, a grim, grizzled, stern-looking Mexican, who glanced sharply about as he set foot on the solid deck, and then, without a word, Loring's hand was placed on the colonel's arm, and the lieutenant's eyes said "Look!" for as the girl's face was turned for an instant toward them, there stood revealed the dusky little maid of the Gila, Blake's siren—Pancha.
CHAPTER X.
Not for many moons did that voyage of the Idaho lose first place in the memory of the bevy of passengers who watched the lights of Guaymas fading away astern that April night. All had been bustle and gayety aboard during an hour of sheltered anchorage. Señor de la Cruz had verified the captain's verdict and opened a case of Sillery and besought all hands to drink to a joyous and prosperous voyage for his beloved daughters, their duenna and his little niece—their cousin from Hermosillo. "All hands" would have included the ship's company had the captain permitted, so hospitable was the Mexican, and indeed was intended to include every soul on the passenger list, most of them boarding the boat at Guaymas. The Señor Coronel Turnbull was formally presented to the Señor de la Cruz and by him to his charming family and their many friends, but the junior officer, on the score of recent and severe illness, had begged to be excused. Loring stood alone at the taffrail, listening in thoughtful silence to the sound of revelry within the brightly-lighted cabin, while the hoarse screeching of the 'scape-pipe drowned all other voices and proclaimed the impatient haste of the skipper to be off. Straight, but often storm-swept, was the southerly run to La Paz—over on the desolate shore of the long, arid peninsula, and the green surges were rolling higher every moment and bursting in thunder into clouds of wind-driven, hissing spray on the rocks beyond the point. Wind and wave were both against their good ship, and every officer and man was at his station awaiting the order to weigh anchor. The mail sacks were aboard. The consul had gone down over the side and still Don Ramon seemed unable to part from his loved ones and the Idaho's champagne. It was the captain who had finally to put abrupt stop to the lingering leave-takings.
"I must be off at once," he said. "Come, Don Ramon, we'll take the best of care of these ladies and land them all at 'Frisco within the fortnight. Kiss 'em all around now and jump for your boat. Come, Señor—I didn't catch the name. Ah, yes, Escalante—the father of the Señorita Pancha, I suppose. No—only her uncle? Well, I'll be her uncle now," and so saying he led the way to the deck. Loring saw the lively party come surging forth from the companionway—señoras, señoritas, gray-haired men and gay young gallants. There was a moment of clasping, clinging embraces, of straining arms and lingering kisses, of crowdings and murmurings here and there, some little sobbing and many tear-wet eyes as the father was finally hurried down the ladder, and then there was further delay and shouts for Escalante, and not until then did Loring, silently watching the animated throng on the port side, become aware of two dark forms in the shadow of the deckhouse on the opposite quarter. One was that of a slender girl, and she was sobbing, she was praying in eager words not to be sent away; she was imploring pitifully to be taken back to the shore. Loring had studied Spanish long enough to understand almost every word, and even before he realized that he was an unwonted listener he had heard both her sobbing plea and the abrupt, almost cruel answer.
"You have no home, nor has your father. You may thank heaven for the chance to get away."
The second officer came bustling round in search of them, and, leaving the girl shrinking and sobbing on the narrow bench in the shadow, the Mexican was hurried off. Before the little boats had fairly cast adrift and the swinging steps were raised the throb of the screw was felt churning the waters of the bay, and as the steamer slowly gathered way and her bow swung gradually seaward, women and girls, kerchief waving, came drifting back along the rail, leaning far over and throwing kisses to the tossing shallops on the dark waves beneath, then gathering about the stunted flagstaff at the stern, calling loudly their parting words, all unconscious of Loring, who had stepped aside to give them room and so found himself close to little Pancha, lost to everybody in the desolation of a loneliness and grief that Loring could not see unmoved, yet could not reconcile with what he had believed of her.
Up to this moment he had heard of her only as an artful girl, the confederate of thieves and ruffians. Up to this moment he had seen her only once, the afternoon she threw herself on Blake, as Blake and he had both come to believe, to prevent his drawing revolver on the two rascals at the ranch. Yet, never had Loring heard such pathetic pleading, never had he seen child or woman in such utter abandonment of woe. Never had he thought it possible that Pancha, the siren of Sancho's ranch—cold, crafty, luring, designing, treacherous as any Carmen ever since portrayed upon the stage—could be capable of such intensity of feeling. Drawing his uniform "cape" snugly about him, for now the sharp sea wind was whistling through the cordage and chilling his fever-weakened frame, Loring leaned against the rail, gazing back at the receding shores, trying not to hear the girl's sobbing. The chatter of the flock of women was incessant. Turnbull and two Guaymas merchants had joined the group, but all were intent on those harbor lights now fast glimmering to mere sparks upon the sea, and the lonely girl sat there forgotten. Not once was voice uplifted in question as to what had become of her. Every moment now the stern was lifted higher in air and then dropped deeper into the roaring, hissing waters, and women tightened their hold upon the taffrail and gave shrill little shrieks, and huddled closer together, and presently one of the elders fell back and begged to be led below, and then another, and by the time the last glimmer of the town had been hid from view and only the steady gleam of the lighthouse shone forth upon their foaming wake, the hardiest of the gay little party of the earlier evening had been carefully assisted down the brass-bound stairway, and when five bells tinkled windily somewhere forward, there, with little hands clasped about the stanchion, a shawl thrown over her head, that head pillowed in her arms, there alone in the darkness and the rush of the wind and sea, there, the very picture of heartbroken girlhood, still sat Pancha, and Loring could bear it no longer.
He was thinking over his Spanish to be sure of his words when the starboard doors of the companion way were suddenly thrown open, and in the bright light from within two burly forms stepped unsteadily forth, then lurched for the nearest support, and Loring heard the jovial tones of Turnbull: