PART II.
SAN FRANCISCO AND NORTHWARD.
I never felt so miserable and so inclined to go to sea to forget myself in hard work as I did that evening after I had bidden farewell to Elsie and her people. It seemed to me that she had let me go too easily out of her life for her to really care for me enough to make her influence my course in the way I had hoped, and hoped still. Indeed, I think that if she had not stayed that one undecided moment after she withdrew her hand from mine, I should have never done what I did do, but have looked for a ship at once. For, after all, I said to myself, what could a modest girl do more? Why, under the circumstances, when she thought me guilty of a deliberate crime, hateful to any woman, to say nothing of my having made love to her at the same time, it was really more than I could have expected or hoped. It showed that I had a hold upon her affections; and then Fanny thought so too, or she would have never said what she did. "Go to Mexico!" indeed; if I wasn't a fool, it was not Mexico the country, but Mexico the steamer she meant. I had one ally, at any rate. Still, I wondered if she knew what Elsie did, though I thought not, for she alone kissed Helen when they said good-by, and Elsie had only given her her hand unwillingly. If I could speak to Fanny it might help me. But I was determined to go northward, and sent my dunnage down on board the steamer that very evening.
In the morning, and early, for I lay awake all that night, a thing I did not remember having done before, I went down on the Front at the bottom of Market Street, where all the tram cars start, and walked to and fro for some hours along the wharves where they discharge lumber, or ship the coal. It was quite a bright morning in the late autumn, and everything was pleasant to look upon in the pure air before it was fouled by the oaths of the drivers of wagons and the jar of traffic. Yet that same noise, which came dimly to me until I was almost run over by a loaded wagon, pleased me a great deal better than the earlier quiet of the morning, and by eight o'clock I was in a healthy frame of mind, healthy enough to help three men with a heavy piece of lumber just by way of exercise. I went back to my room, washed my hands, had breakfast, and went on board the steamer, careless if the Flemings saw me, though at first I had determined to keep out of their way until the vessel was at sea. I thanked my stars that I did so, for I saw Fanny by herself on deck, and when she caught sight of me she clapped her hands and smiled.
"Well, and where are you going, Mr. Ticehurst?" said she, nodding at me as if she guessed my secret.
"I am going to take your advice and go to Mexico!" I answered.
"Is it far here? By land do you go, or water?"
"Not far, Fanny; in fact——"
"You are——"
"There now!" said I, laughing in my turn.
"Oh, I am so glad, Mr. Ticehurst!" said she; "for——" and then she stopped.