ROMANCE RECEIVES A COLD DOUCHE
But none of these thoughts showed in Maseden's face. He laughed easily
and explained in voluble Spanish that he swore in English occasionally,
having picked up the correct formula from an American senor with whom
he once took a hunting trip into the interior.
The sailor, hearing this flow of a language he understood, and not able
to measure the idiomatic fluency of Maseden's English, accepted the
story without demur, but the fourth officer and quartermaster, both
Americans, were evidently puzzled.
He soon got rid of the too-effusive half-caste, and retired to his
berth. Thank goodness, since the one person on board mainly concerned
was perforce aware of his identity, he was free to wash his face and
take a bath! To oblige a lady he would have remained unwashed all the
way to Buenos Ayres; now, every other consideration might go hang.
Finding a steward, he gave further cause for bewilderment by asking to
be allowed to use a bath-room.
Greatly to Maseden's relief, his lapse into the vernacular seemed to
evoke little or no comment subsequently. The captain heard of it, but
was far too irritated by the faulty behavior of a ring-bolt (examination
showed a bad flaw in the metal) to pay any special heed. As for the
half-caste sailor, his gratitude to Maseden took the form of describing
him admiringly as "the _vaquero_ who could swear like an _Americano_,"
an equivocal compliment which actually fostered the belief that Maseden
was what he represented himself to be--a vagabond cowboy migrating from
one coast of the great South American continent to the other.
His peculiar habits, therefore, shown in such trivial details as a
desire for personal cleanliness and a certain fastidiousness at table,
were attributed to the same exotic tutelage. Of course, when he spoke
any intelligent Spaniard could have detected faults in phrase or
pronunciation, but he had a ready resource in the _patois_ of San Juan,
and no man on board was competent to assess him accurately by both
standards.
He settled down quickly to the exigencies of life at sea. Five days
after leaving Cartagena he was an expert in the matter of keeping his
feet when the vessel was rolling or pitching, or performing a corkscrew
movement which combined the worst features of each.
When the _Southern Cross_ entered more southerly latitudes her
passengers were given ample opportunity to test their skill in this
respect. The weather grew colder each day, and with the drop in the
thermometer came gray skies and rough seas.
There are two tracks for ocean-going steamers bound down the west coast.
The open Pacific offers no hindrance to safe navigation, except an
occasional heavy gale. The inner course, through Smyth's Channel, is
sheltered but tortuous, and the commander of the _Southern Cross_
elected to save time by heading direct for the Straits of Tierra del
Fuego. The ship was speedy and well-found. A stiff nor'wester tended
rather to help her along, and she should reach Buenos Ayres within
fifteen days.
Maseden contrived to buy a heavy poncho, or cloak, from one of the crew.
Wrapped in this useful garment, he patrolled the small space of deck at
his disposal, and kept an unfailing eye for the reappearance at the
for'ard rail of one or other of the Misses Gray; yet day after day
slipped by and they remained obstinately hidden.
Once or twice, when the weather permitted, he climbed to the fore deck,
whence he could scan a large part of the promenade deck on both the port
and starboard sides. On the port side, however, a wind-screen
intervened.
Twice he thought he saw Madeleine Gray leaning on the port rail, talking
to Sturgess--and wearing the very dress in which she was married! Either
by accident or design she vanished almost instantly on each occasion.
It was nonsensical, of course, but he began to harbor a sentiment of
annoyance with Sturgess, who, by some queer contriving of fortune,
seemed to be drawn rather to the company of Madeleine than of sister
Nina. Any real feeling of jealousy would have been absurd, almost
ludicrous, under the circumstances.
For all that, Maseden couldn't understand why the fellow apparently
devoted himself to the company of one sister to the neglect, or
intentional exclusion, of the other; while the lady's behavior, assuming
that she knew of the presence of her "husband" within a few yards, was,
to say the least, reprehensible if not provocative.
By this time, Maseden was fully convinced that his wife had recognized
him. Oddly enough, the somewhat bizarre costume he wore would help in
betraying him to her eyes. She had seen him only when arrayed in even
more startling guise. Her memory of him, therefore, would depend wholly
on his features and physique, and the incongruity of an unmistakably
American voice coming from a _vaquero_ could not fail to be enhanced by
the gala attire affected by that erstwhile gay spark, old Lopez's
nephew.
Moreover, Maseden had bribed the forecastle steward to find out from one
of the saloon attendants what had happened to the two ladies on the
promenade deck when the pulley fell. One of them, the man said, was so
startled that she nearly fainted, and the American senor had carried her
to a chair.
Obviously, on an American vessel, with American officers, engineers, and
quartermasters, for one whose only tongue was Spanish it was difficult
to extract information. The Spanish-speaking members of the crew knew
little or nothing of the passengers, while Maseden's part of the ship
was as completely shut off from the saloon as are the dwellings of the
poor from the palaces of the rich.
Many times was he tempted to change his quarters, and thus tacitly admit
his identity; but cold prudence as often forbade any such folly. Even if
the full extent of his adventures in Cartagena were unknown on board, it
was a quite certain thing that the story must have reached Buenos Ayres
long ago.
Bad as was the odor of the republic in the outer world, it still
possessed the rights of a sovereign state, and the last thing Maseden
desired was an enforced return to the Castle of San Juan, there to stand
his trial anew for conspiracy, plus an undoubted attempt to murder the
president! That would be a stiff price to pay merely in order to sate
his curiosity as to the motive underlying a woman's strange whim.
* * * * *
On the sixth night of the voyage the opportunity for which he was
looking was offered as unexpectedly as it had been persistently withheld
earlier.
After a very unpleasant day of wind and rain the weather improved
markedly. True, the sky had not cleared, and the darkness which fell
swiftly over a leaden sea was of a quality almost palpable.
Had he troubled to recall the sealore gleaned from many books of travel,
Maseden would have known that such a change was by no means indicative
of smoother seas and days of sunshine in the near future. The ship was
merely crossing the center of a cyclonic area. Ere morning she would
probably meet a fiercer gale than that through which she had just
passed.
Such minor considerations as to the state of the elements carried little
weight, however, when contrasted with the immediate and solid fact that
Maseden, giving an upward eye to the promenade deck about nine o'clock,
discerned a solitary female figure leaning on the rail.
Since there were no other women on board, this must be either Madeleine
or Nina. As it happened, the forecastle was deserted, in the sense that
its usual occupants were either asleep or busied with the duties of the
hour. Above the girl's head paced the officer of the watch. Up in the
bows were two men on the look-out. Otherwise, the fore part of the ship
was untenanted save for Maseden himself and the slim, cloaked form which
seemed to be peering aimlessly into the impenetrable wall of darkness
ahead.
Apparently the wind had died down. There were no sounds save the normal
ones--the onward rush of the ship, the swish of an occasional swell
cleft by the cut-water, the steady thud of the screw, and the equally
regular creaking of planks and panels swollen by heavy rain after
undergoing tropical heat.
It was a night rich with suggestion of mystery and romance. Some new
ichor stirred in Maseden's veins, firing his spirit to emprise. Come
what might, he resolved to have speech with the lady, be she wife in
name or merely sister-in-law!
But how contrive it? If he hailed her from the main deck, the officer on
the bridge would overhear, and straightway play a domineering hand in
the game. If he went aft, through a narrow gangway leading past the
engine-room and various officers' cabins, he could reach a sliding door
giving access to the saloon companion, but his presence there would
undoubtedly be noticed, evoking a stern order to betake himself to his
own quarters.
The third method was the direct one. A series of iron rungs led
vertically up the face of the superstructure, and, as sailors
occasionally passed that way, the girl would not necessarily be
alarmed by seeing a man coming up.
The officer on duty might detect him, of course; but even he was liable
to mistake him for one of the ship's company.
It has been seen already that Maseden was of the rare order of mankind
which, having once made up its mind, acts unhesitatingly. No sooner had
he elected for the iron ladder than he had crossed the deck and was
mounting rapidly. It chanced that the officer did not see him.
In a few seconds he was standing on the promenade deck. Then he had an
attack of stage-fright. Many an actor has strode valiantly from wings to
footlights only to find his tongue glued to the roof of his mouth. This
was Maseden's "star turn," and not a word could he utter!
By a singular coincidence, the lady was equally nervous. She gave scant
attention to the commonplace occurrence that a member of the crew should
walk aft from the dim interior of the forecastle and hurry up the
ladder, but the situation altered dramatically when a faint gleam from
a window of the smoking-room fell on the tarnished silver braid and gilt
buttons of Maseden's jacket of black cloth and velvet.
The light, such as it was, fell directly on the girl's face as she
turned towards the intruder. Her eyes, blue sapphires by day, were now
strangely dark. Maseden saw that her expression was one of panic if not
of actual terror. He was unpleasantly reminded of a bird fascinated by a
snake; the displeasing simile stirred his wits and unlocked his tongue.
"I'm sorry if I have frightened you," he said quietly, "but the chance
of securing a few words of explanation seemed too good to be lost. You
owe me something of the kind, don't you?"
"Why?" came the truly feminine reply.
"Because, unless I am greatly mistaken, you are the lady whom I had the
honor of marrying in the Castle of San Juan at Cartagena. You may be
known as Miss Madge Gray on board this ship, but your name in the
register was Madeleine."
"My name is Nina, not Madge."
Maseden was taken aback for a few seconds, yet the fact could not be
gainsaid that the speaker, whether Madge or Nina, did not repudiate the
general accuracy of his statement. Moreover, he was almost sure of his
ground now. His "wife" was probably flirting with Sturgess. Nina, as
usual, was left to her own devices, since the forecastle steward had
reported that Senor Gray was ill and confined to his cabin.
"At any rate, you do not deny that either your sister or yourself is
legally entitled to pose as Mrs. Philip Alexander Maseden?" he said.
"I am not aware that either of us can fairly be described as posing in
that distinguished capacity."
The retort was glib enough. It amused the man.
"Perhaps I put the bald truth rather awkwardly," he said. "Let me, then,
ask a plain question. Did I marry you, or your sister, last Tuesday
morning?"
"You certainly err if you think that I shall discuss the affairs of my
family with a complete stranger," was the unhesitating answer.
"Yet you, or your sister, did not scruple to marry one."
"Are _you_ Mr. Maseden?"
"I am. Haven't I said so? I implied it, at any rate."
"Then why are you in disguise, posing--it is your own word--as a Spanish
cowboy?"
"Because I'm trying to save my miserable life. Don't think me
ungrateful, madam. I owe my escape to the phenomenal circumstances
brought about by the desire of a charming young lady to become
Mrs. Maseden, if only for a brief half hour. I am not claiming
any--privileges, shall I say?--on that account. But I can hardly credit
that, having gone through the ordeal of such a ceremony, you would
refuse to tell me your motive, so I reluctantly revert to my first
opinion, namely, that your sister is my wife."
"Reluctantly! Why reluctantly?"
There was more than a touch of bewilderment in the cry. Maseden
interpreted it as a fencer's trick to gain time.
"I don't mind being absolutely candid," he laughed. "You see, time hangs
heavy on my hands here. I have nothing to do except watch for a glimpse
of an unknown wife. Queer, isn't it? Anyhow, my fate doesn't seem to
worry sister Madge, who finds consolation elsewhere; so, of the two, if
I must be wed to one of you, I imagine I would prefer you."
"I think you are intolerably rude, Mr. Maseden. Madge was right when she
said--"
She checked herself with a little gasp of dismay. Maseden laughed again.
"Please don't spare me," he cried. "What did Madge say?"
"I decline to discuss the matter any further."
"But why should we quarrel over a minor point? You have tacitly
admitted that your sister married me. Give me some notion of her motive.
That is all I ask. It may help."
"How help?"
"When I take unto myself a wife I expect to be allowed some freedom of
choice in the matter. I certainly refuse to have her picked for me by a
rascal like Steinbaum. If I win clear of Buenos Ayres and reach New York
I shall take the speediest steps to undo the matrimonial knot tied in
Cartagena. There may be legal complications, which will be attended, I
suppose, by a certain amount of publicity. It will help some, as Mr.
Sturgess would say, if I know just why the lady wanted to wed in the
first instance. Surely there is reason behind that simple request. Your
sister begged to be allowed to marry me because I was condemned to
death. At least, such was Steinbaum's story. Was _that_ true, to begin
with?"
No answer. Maseden felt that he had cornered her.
"There must have been some such ground for an extraordinary action," he
went on. "To the best of my knowledge she had never seen me. I question
if she even knew my name. I--"
A door opened, and a stream of light fell on the deck some feet away.
Sturgess's voice reached them clearly.
"Guess she's tucked up cozy in a deck chair," he was saying. "It's no
time to retire to roost yet, anyhow."
"Please go now," whispered Nina tremulously. "You mustn't be seen
talking to me. I--I'll discuss things with Madge, and if possible, come
here about the same hour to-morrow, or next day. I--I'll do my best."
Without another word, Maseden swung himself over the rail. When below
the level of the deck he clung to the ladder and listened, not meaning
to act ungenerously, but because of the other man's rapid approach.
"Ah, there you are, Miss Nina!" cried Sturgess. "Sister Madge is bored
stiff by my company, but was polite enough to pretend that she was
anxious about you."
"I've been star-gazing," said the girl, hastening towards him.
"So've I," grinned Sturgess. "You two girls have the finest eyes I've
ever--"
His voice trailed away into silence. Maseden dropped to the deck.
"Hang it all!" he muttered, strangely disconsolate. "When Fate took me
by the scruff of the neck and married me to one of two sisters, neither
of whom I had ever seen, she might have been kind enough, the jade, to
tie me to the right one!"
Yet, even to his thinking, Madge and Nina were like as a couple of pins!
Being an eminently sensible sort of fellow, he realized in the next
breath that Madge might be quite as nice a girl as Nina.
Then the thought struck him that she was purposely making things easier
for him by cultivating a friendship with Sturgess. In any case, Sturgess
was obviously destined to act as a pawn in the game. Even he, Maseden,
had not scrupled to use that gentleman at sight when anxious to board
the _Southern Cross_ without attracting the attention of the
news-mongering boatmen of Cartagena.
* * * * *
That night he lay awake for hours. For one thing, the ship was running
into bad weather again, and complained nosily of the buffeting her stout
frame was receiving. For another, his own course was beset with
difficulties. He failed completely to understand the attitude of sister
Nina.
If Madeleine--or Madge, as he had better learned to distinguish her--had
sought marriage with a man about to die as a means to escape from some
unbearable duress, was her plight accentuated rather than bettered by
the fact that her husband still lived? If so, the announcement that he
meant to obtain a legal dissolution of the bond at the earliest possible
moment would relieve the tension.
But what if her need demanded that she should remain wed, a wife in
name only? A development of that sort foreshadowed complexities of a
rare order. Maseden knew himself as one capable of Quixotic action--even
the scheming Steinbaum had paid him _that_ tribute--but it was asking
too much that he should go through life burdened with a wife who treated
him as a benevolent stranger.
Common sense urged that they should meet and discuss a most trying and
equivocal situation as frankly and fully as might be. Why, then, had
Nina Gray been so disturbed, so anxious to keep the married pair apart?
Both girls knew he was alive. What purpose could it serve that the fact
should be ignored?
He puzzled his brain to recall incidents he had heard of Steinbaum's
history, but investigation along that line drew a blank. Was Suarez
mixed up in the embroglio? It was unlikely. Though the man had spent
some years in the United States and in Europe, he had not left San Juan
since he, Maseden, came there, and, before that period, both Madge and
Nina Gray must have been girls in short frocks and long tresses.
Perhaps the father's record would provide a clew. Somehow, though he had
never set eyes on Mr. Gray save as a shadowy form on a dark night,
Maseden sensed him as unsympathetic. He was forced to form a judgment on
the flimsiest of material, having none other; but Gray's voice, his way
of speaking to his daughters, had grated.
First impressions are treacherous guides; nevertheless the philosopher
whom they cannot mislead does not exist.
The following day was the longest in Maseden's experience. Monotony, in
itself, is wearying; when, to a dull routine of meals and occasional
talk with men of an inferior type is added the positive discomfort of
confinement in the most exposed and cramped part of a ship during a
stiff gale, monotony becomes akin to torture.
At last, however, night fell. There was no improvement in the weather,
which, if anything, grew worse; but a change in the ship's course, or a
shifting of the wind--no one to whom Maseden might speak could give him
any reliable data on the point--brought the _Southern Cross_ on a more
even keel.
Here, at least, was some slight compensation for the leaden-footed hours
of waiting. Nina Gray might be a good sailor, but it was hardly
reasonable to expect that she would keep her tryst when the big steamer
was trying alternately to stand on end or roll bodily over to port.
About nine o'clock Maseden made out a shrouded figure in the position
where his "sister-in-law" had stood the previous night. He hastened
from the shelter of the forecastle, and was promptly drenched from head
to foot by a shower of spray. He was half-way up the ladder when a voice
reached him.
"Please go back," it said. "I'll come to the gangway on the starboard
side."
He regained the deck, made for the right-hand gangway, and soon had the
satisfaction of seeing the girl walking swiftly along the dimly-lighted
corridor.
He hardly knew how to greet her. To bid her "Good evening," or murmur
some platitude about her goodness in keeping the appointment in such
vile weather, would have sounded banal.
The lady, however, when they came face to face, settled all doubts on
the question of etiquette by saying breathlessly:
"I have had a long talk with my sister, Mr. Maseden, and she bids me
tell you that she cannot meet you herself. You were so generous, so kind
to her, at a moment when your thoughts might well have been centered in
your own terrible fate, that she cannot bear the ordeal of asking you
the last favor of forgetting her.
"Of course, every facility will be given for the dissolution of the
marriage. I have written here the address of a firm of lawyers in
Philadelphia who will act with your legal representatives when the
matter comes before the courts. For your own purposes, I understand,
you wish to remain unknown while on board this ship. We have arranged to
travel to New York by the first American liner sailing from Buenos Ayres
after our arrival. Perhaps you will be good enough to choose another
vessel, or, if your affairs are urgent, _we_ would wait for a later one.
Can you let me know your wishes now in that matter?"
Maseden was so astonished that he literally caught the girl by the
shoulder and turned her partly round so that the light of a distant lamp
fell on her face. The buffeting of the gale, aided, no doubt, by a
feeling of excitement, had lent her a fine color, but, if her utterance
was a trifle broken at first, it had soon become calm and measured, nor
did she seem to resent his cavalier treatment.
"Are you joking?" he said, smiling in sheer perplexity.
"I fail to find any humor in my words," came the instant reply.
"Quite so. They might have been framed by a lawyer. Isn't there a ghost
of a joke in that mere fact?"
"It appeared to my sister, and I fully agree with her, that we are
suggesting the best way, the only way, out of an embarrassing dilemma."
"Yes," agreed Maseden, drawing a long breath. "I agree to all the
terms; I insist only on priority of sailing from Buenos Ayres. I don't
see why I should risk my life just to save you a trifling
inconvenience."
"Then here is the address I spoke of," and she proffered an envelope.
"Good. We'll leave the rest to the law, Miss Nina."
"Thank you. Good-by."
She would have passed him, but he was on the after side of the gangway,
and his outstretched hand restrained her.
"One moment, please," he said. "I want you to tell your sister that she
has thoroughly--disillusioned me."
"I'll do that," she assured him, and he could not help but regard her
airy self-possession as the most surprising factor in a remarkable
situation.
"And you, too," he went on. "Something has happened to you since last
night. Somehow you are--harder. Forgive me if I choose unpleasant
adjectives."
She hesitated before replying. Perhaps she felt the quiet scorn
underlying the words.
"Where my unhappy family is concerned, the forgiveness must come wholly
from you," she said at last. "May I go now, Mr. Maseden? Once more,
thank you for all that you have done and will do. Remember, when this
miserable affair reaches the newspapers, it is not your reputation that
will suffer, but the woman's!"
She left him gazing blankly after her. There was a tense _vibrato_ in
the tone of the girl's voice that touched some responsive chord in the
man's breast.
Then he became aware that he was soaked to the skin, and the wind was
piercingly cold.
He murmured a phrase strongly reminiscent of the _Americano_ who took
hunting trips into the interior of Central America, and hurried to his
cabin, where he stripped and rubbed his limbs to a glow before turning
in.