“Why, certainly it is!” I exclaimed. “But how in the world did you know that?”
“Because,” she answered, “when you were brought ashore yesterday, Captain Ricardo sent for me, and said: ‘This young fellow is Dick Grenvile, the son of a once very dear friend of mine; and I want you, Lotta, and Mammy, to do your utmost to nurse him back to health and strength again.’”
“And you and Mammy have been doing so with marvellously satisfactory results,” said I. “And that, I suppose, accounts for the fact of your face seeming familiar to me; I probably saw you once or twice during my delirium?”
“Yes,” she admitted, “you certainly did see me—once or twice.”
“Well, Lotta—I suppose I may call you Lotta, may I not? Señorita sounds so very formal, does it not?” I suggested.
“Oh, yes, certainly!” assented my companion. “And I may call you Dick, may I not? Señor sounds so very formal, does it not?” Her quaint mimicry of my earnestness of manner was irresistibly droll.
“Of course you may,” I agreed eagerly. “Well, Lotta—now, let me remember—what was it I was about to say? Oh, yes, of course—how came you to be a prisoner in the power of this man Ricardo?”
“Very simply, yet in a manner that you would scarcely credit,” was the reply. “You must know that my mother died just after I was born, my father when I was just two years old. Up to then Mammy had looked after me, but when my father died his estates were taken in charge by some people whom my father had appointed to look after them—what do you call those people—?”
“Trustees, we call them in England,” I suggested.
“Yes,” assented Lotta, “they were my father’s trustees, and my guardians, empowered to look after my interests and manage the estates until I should arrive at the age of eighteen. When I was seven years of age the trustees decided to send me over to Old Spain to be educated, and I accordingly went, in charge of the wife of one of them, with Mammy to look after me. I was educated at the convent of Santa Clara, in Seville, where I remained until my fourteenth birthday, when I was taken out of the convent and placed on board a ship bound to Havana, my guardians having decided that I had received as much education as was necessary, and that the time had arrived when I ought to return to Cuba and take my place as mistress of my household and owner of the vast estate of which I was the heiress. Then a terrible misfortune befell us: the ship on board which I was a passenger caught fire, and was utterly destroyed, and everybody was obliged to take refuge in the boats. Then, to add still further to our misery, a gale sprang up, and the boats became separated. We suffered dreadfully during that gale, and were several times in the greatest danger of being drowned. Then, when the gale was over, the sailors in our boat knew not in which direction to steer, and so we went drifting aimlessly hither and thither, not knowing where we were going, but hoping, day after day, that a ship would come in sight and pick us up. And very soon our food and water became exhausted, and our sufferings intensified to such an extent that some of the men went mad and threw themselves into the sea. As for me, I became so weak at last that I lost consciousness, and did not again revive until I found myself on board the Barracouta, with Mammy looking after me. We arrived here before I was well enough to walk, and here I have remained ever since, that is to say, nearly two years.”