CHAPTER III
Under the Influence of the Moon.
My days now began to drift rather aimlessly, as without apparent purpose I continued to linger on an island that might well seem to have little attraction to a stranger—how little I could see by the mystification of the good Tom, in whom, for once, of course, I could not confide. Yet I had a vague purpose; or, at least, I had a feeling that, if I waited on, something would develop in the direction of my hopes. That doubloon still suggested that it was the key to a door of fascinating mystery to which Chance might at any moment direct me.
And—why not admit it?—apart from my buried treasure, to the possible discovery of which the doubloon seemed to point, I was possessed with a growing desire for another glimpse of those haunting eyes. They needed not their association with the mysterious gold, they were magnetic enough to draw any man, with even the rudiments of imagination, along the path of the unknown. All the paths out of the little settlement were paths into the unknown, and, day after day, I followed one or another of them out into the wilderness, taking a gun with me, as an ostensible excuse for any spying eye, and bringing back with me occasional bags of the wild pigeons which were plentiful on the island.
One day I had thus wandered unusually far afield, and at nightfall found myself still several miles from home, on a rocky path overhanging the sea. The coast-line had been gradually mounting in a series of precipitous headlands, at the foot of which the sea made a low booming that suggested hidden caves. Looking over the edge in places, one could see that it had hollowed out the porous rock well under the base of the cliffs, and here and there fallen masses of boulder told of a gradual encroachment which, in course of time, would topple down into the abyss the precarious pathway on which I stood. Inland the usual level scrub gave place to a stretch of wild forest, very dense, and composed of trees of many varieties, loftier than was usual on the island.
There was no sign of habitation anywhere. It was a wild and lonely place, and presently over its savage beauty stole the glamour of the moon rising far over the sea. I sat down on a ledge of the cliffs, and watched the moonlight grow in intensity, as the darkness of the woods deepened behind me. It was a night full of witchcraft; a night on which the stars, the moon, and the sea together seemed hinting at some wonderful thing about to happen.
Far down in the clear water I could see the giant sea-fans waving in a moony twilight, touched eerily in those glassy depths with sudden rays of the spectral light; soft bowers of phosphorescence spread a secret radiance about dimly branching coral groves. And, all the while, the path of the moon over the sea was growing stronger—laying, it would seem, an even firmer pathway of silver stretching to the very foot of the cliff-side.
I am not given to quoting poetry, but involuntarily there came to my mind some lines remembered from boyhood:
If on some balmy summer night
You rowed across the moon-path white,
And saw the shining sea grow fair
With silver scales and golden hair—
What would you do?