"Did you see anything to frighten you?" I insisted.
"No, but I felt something." He dropped his cigarette and ground it
into the sand viciously. "To cut it short," he said, "I am most
unwillingly led to believe that there are--creatures--of some sort in
the Everglades--living creatures quite as large as you or I--and that
they are perfectly transparent--as transparent as a colorless
jellyfish."
Instantly the veiled import of Professor Farrago's letter was made
clear to me. He, too, believed that.
"It embarrasses me like the devil to say such a thing," continued
Rowan, digging in the sand with his spurred heels. "It seems so--so
like a whopping lie--it seems so childish and ridiculous--so cursed
cheap! But I fled; and there you are. I might add," he said,
indifferently, "that I have the ordinary portion of courage allotted
to normal men."
"But what do you believe these--these animals to be?" I asked,
fascinated.
"I don't know." An obstinate look came into his eyes. "I don't know,
and I absolutely refuse to speculate for the benefit of anybody. I
wouldn't do it for my friend Professor Farrago; and I'm not going to
do it for you," he ended, laughing a rather grim laugh that somehow
jarred me into realizing the amazing import of his story. For I did
not doubt it, strange as it was--fantastic, incredible though it
sounded in the ears of a scientist.
What it was that carried conviction I do not know--perhaps the fact
that my superior credited it; perhaps the manner of narration. Told in
quiet, commonplace phrases, by an exceedingly practical and
unimaginative young man who was plainly embarrassed in the telling,
the story rang out like a shout in a cañon, startling because of the
absolute lack of emphasis employed in the telling.
"Professor Farrago asked me to speak of this to no one except the man
who should come to his assistance. He desired the first chance of
clearing this--this rather perplexing matter. No doubt he didn't want
exploring parties prowling about him," added Rowan, smiling. "But
there's no fear of that, I fancy. I never expect to tell that story
again to anybody; I shouldn't have told him, only somehow it's worried
me for three years, and though I was deadly afraid of ridicule, I
finally made up my mind that science ought to have a hack at it.
"When I was in New York last winter I summoned up courage and wrote
Professor Farrago. He came to see me at the Holland House that same
evening; I told him as much as I ever shall tell anybody. That is all,
Mr. Gilland."
For a long time I sat silent, musing over the strange words. After a
while I asked him whether Professor Farrago was supplied with
provisions; and he said he was; that a great store of staples and tins
of concentrated rations had been carried in as far as Little Sprite
Lake; that Professor Farrago was now there alone, having insisted upon
dismissing all those he had employed.
"There was no practical use for a guide," added Rowan, "because no
cracker, no Indian, and no guide knows the region beyond the Seminole
country."
I rose, thanking him and offering my hand. He took it and shook it in
manly fashion, saying: "I consider Professor Farrago a very brave man;
I may say the same of any man who volunteers to accompany him.
Good-bye, Mr. Gilland; I most earnestly wish for your success.
Professor Farrago left this letter for you."
And that was all. I climbed back into the rickety carriage, carrying
my unopened letter; the negro driver cracked his whip and whistled,
and the horses trotted inland over a fine shell road which was to lead
us across Verbena Junction to Citron City. Half an hour later we
crossed the tracks at Verbena and turned into a broad marl road. This
aroused me from my deep and speculative reverie, and after a few
moments I asked Miss Barrison's indulgence and read the letter from
Professor Farrago which Mr. Rowan had given me:
"DEAR MR. GILLAND,--You now know all I dared not write,
fearing to bring a swarm of explorers about my ears in case
the letter was lost, and found by unscrupulous meddlers. If
you still are willing to volunteer, knowing all that I know,
join me as soon as possible. If family considerations deter
you from taking what perhaps is an insane risk, I shall not
expect you to join me. In that event, return to New York
immediately and send Kingsley.
"Yours, F."
"What the deuce is the matter with him!" I exclaimed, irritably. "I'll
take any chances Kingsley does!"
Miss Barrison looked up in surprise.
"Miss Barrison," I said, plunging into the subject headfirst, "I'm
extremely sorry, but I have news that forces me to believe the journey
too dangerous for you to attempt, so I think that it would be much
better--" The consternation in her pretty face checked me.
"I'm awfully sorry," I muttered, appalled by her silence.
"But--but you engaged me!"
"I know it--I should not have done it. I only--"
"But you did engage me, didn't you?"
"I believe that I did--er--oh, of course--"
"But a verbal contract is binding between honorable people, isn't it,
Mr. Gilland?"
"Yes, but--"
"And ours was a verbal contract; and in consideration you paid me my
first week's salary, and I bought shirt-waists and a short skirt and
three changes of--and tooth-brushes and--"
"I know, I know," I groaned. "But I'll fix all that."
"You can't if you break your contract."
"Why not?"
"Because," she said, flushing up, "I should not accept."
"You don't understand--"
"Really I do. You are going into a dangerous country and you're afraid
I'll be frightened."
"It's something like that."
"Tell me what are the dangers?"
"Alligators, big, bitey snakes--"
"Oh, you've said all that before!"
"Seminoles--"
"And that too. What else is there? Did the young man in the sun-helmet
tell you of something worse?"
"Yes--much worse! Something so dreadfully horrible that--"
"What?"
"I am not at liberty to tell you, Miss Barrison," I said, striving to
appear shocked.
"It would not make any difference anyway," she observed, calmly. "I'm
not afraid of anything in the world."
"Yes, you are!" I said. "Listen to me; I'd be awfully glad to have you
go--I--I really had no idea how I'd miss you--miss such pleasant
companionship. But it is not possible--" The recollection of Professor
Farrago's aversion suddenly returned. "No, no," I said, "it can't be
done. I'm most unhappy over this mistake of mine; please don't look as
though you were ready to cry!"
"Don't discharge me, Mr. Gilland," she said.
"I'm a brute to do it, but I must; I was a bigger brute to engage you,
but I did. Don't--please don't look at me that way, Miss Barrison! As
a matter of fact, I'm tender-hearted and I can't endure it."
"If you only knew what I had been through you wouldn't send me away,"
she said, in a low voice. "It took my last penny to clothe myself and
pay for the last lesson at the college of stenography. I--I lived on
almost nothing for weeks; every respectable place was filled; I walked
and walked and walked, and nobody wanted me--they all required people
with experience--and how can I have experience until I begin, Mr.
Gilland? I was perfectly desperate when I went to see you, knowing
that you had advertised for a man--" The slightest break in her clear
voice scared me.
"I'm not going to cry," she said, striving to smile. "If I must go, I
will go. I--I didn't mean to say all this--but--but I've been so--so
discouraged;--and you were not very cross with me--"
Smitten with remorse, I picked up her hand and fell to patting it
violently, trying to think of something to say. The exercise did not
appear to stimulate my wits.
"Then--then I'm to go with you?" she asked.
"I will see," I said, weakly, "but I fear there's trouble ahead for
this expedition."
"I fear there is," she agreed, in a cheerful voice. "You have a rifle
and a cage in your luggage. Are you going to trap Indians and have me
report their language?"
"No, I'm not going to trap Indians," I said, sharply. "They may trap
us--but that's a detail. What I want to say to you is this: Professor
Farrago detests unmarried women, and I forgot it when I engaged you."
"Oh, is that all?" she asked, laughing.
"Not all, but enough to cost me my position."
"How absurd! Why, there are millions of things we might
do!--millions!"
"What's one of them?" I inquired.
"Why, we might pretend to be married!" Her frank and absolutely
innocent delight in this suggestion was refreshing, but troubling.
"We would have to be demonstrative to make that story go," I said.
"Why? Well-bred people are not demonstrative in public," she retorted,
turning a trifle pink.
"No, but in private--"
"I think there is no necessity for carrying a pleasantry into our
private life," she said, in a perfectly amiable voice. "Anyway, if
Professor Farrago's feelings are to be spared, no sacrifice on the
part of a mere girl could be too great," she added, gayly; "I will
wear men's clothes if you wish."
"You may have to anyhow in the jungle," I said; "and as it's not an
uncommon thing these days, nobody would ever take you for anything
except what you are--a very wilful and plucky and persistent and--"
"And what, Mr. Gilland?"
"And attractive," I muttered.
"Thank you, Mr. Gilland."
"You're welcome," I snapped. The near whistle of a locomotive warned
us, and I rose in the carriage, looking out across the sand-hills.
"That is probably our train," observed the pretty stenographer.
"_Our_ train!"
"Yes; isn't it?"
"Then you insist--"
"Ah, no, Mr. Gilland; I only trust implicitly in my employer."
"We'll wait till we get to Citron City," I said, weakly; "then it will
be time enough to discuss the situation, won't it?"
"Yes, indeed," she said, smiling; but she knew, and I already feared,
that the situation no longer admitted of discussion. In a few moments
more we emerged, without warning, from the scrub-crested sand-hills
into the single white street of Citron City, where China-trees hung
heavy with bloom, and magnolias, already set with perfumed candelabra,
spread soft, checkered shadows over the marl.
The train lay at the station, oceans of heavy, black smoke lazily
flowing from the locomotive; negroes were hoisting empty fruit-crates
aboard the baggage-car, through the door of which I caught a glimpse
of my steel cage and remaining paraphernalia, all securely crated.
"Telegram hyah foh Mistuh Gilland," remarked the operator, lounging at
his window as we descended from our dusty vehicle. He had not
addressed himself to anybody in particular, but I said that I was Mr.
Gilland, and he produced the envelope. "Toted in from Okeechobee?" he
inquired, listlessly.
"Probably; it's signed 'Farrago,' isn't it?"
"It's foh yoh, suh, I reckon," said the operator, handing it out with
a yawn. Then he removed his hat and fanned his head, which was
perfectly bald.
I opened the yellow envelope. "Get me a good dog with points," was the
laconic message; and it irritated me to receive such idiotic
instructions at such a time and in such a place. A good dog? Where the
mischief could I find a dog in a town consisting of ten houses and a
water-tank? I said as much to the bald-headed operator, who smiled
wearily and replaced his hat: "Dawg? They's moh houn'-dawgs in Citron
City than they's wood-ticks to keep them busy. I reckon a dollah 'll
do a heap foh you, suh."
"Could you get me a dog for a dollar?" I asked;--"one with points?"
"Points? I sholy can, suh;--plenty of points. What kind of dawg do yoh
requiah, suh?--live dawg? daid dawg? houn'-dawg? raid-dawg? hawg-dawg?
coon-dawg?--"
The locomotive emitted a long, lazy, softly modulated and thoroughly
Southern toot. I handed the operator a silver dollar, and he presently
emerged from his office and slouched off up the street, while I walked
with Miss Barrison to the station platform, where I resumed the
discussion of her future movements.
"You are very young to take such a risk," I said, gravely. "Had I not
better buy your ticket back to New York? The north-bound train meets
this one. I suppose we are waiting for it now--" I stopped, conscious
of her impatience.
Her face flushed brightly: "Yes; I think it best. I have embarrassed
you too long already--"
"Don't say that!" I muttered. "I--I--shall be deadly bored without
you."
"I am not an entertainer, only a stenographer," she said, curtly.
"Please get me my ticket, Mr. Gilland."
She gazed at me from the car-platform; the locomotive tooted two
drawling toots.
"It is for your sake," I said, avoiding her gaze as the far-off
whistle of the north-bound express came floating out of the blue
distance.
She did not answer; I fished out my watch, regarding it in silence,
listening to the hum of the approaching train, which ought presently
to bear her away into the North, where nothing could menace her except
the brilliant pitfalls of a Christian civilization. But I stood
there, temporizing, unable to utter a word as her train shot by us
with a rush, slower, slower, and finally stopped, with a long-drawn
sigh from the air-brakes.
At that instant the telegraph-operator appeared, carrying a dog by the
scruff of the neck--a sad-eyed, ewe-necked dog, from the four corners
of which dangled enormous, cushion-like paws. He yelped when he beheld
me. Miss Barrison leaned down from the car-platform and took the
animal into her arms, uttering a suppressed exclamation of pity as she
lifted him.
"You have your hands full," she said to me; "I'll take him into the
car for you."
She mounted the steps; I followed with the valises, striving to get a
good view of my acquisition over her shoulder.
"That isn't the kind of dog I wanted!" I repeated again and again,
inspecting the animal as it sprawled on the floor of the car at the
edge of Miss Barrison's skirt. "That dog is all voice and feet and
emotion! What makes it stick up its paws like that? I don't want that
dog and I'm not going to identify myself with it! Where's the
operator--"
I turned towards the car-window; the operator's bald head was visible
on a line with the sill, and I made motions at him. He bowed with
courtly grace, as though I were thanking him.
"I'm not!" I cried, shaking my head. "I wanted a dog with points--not
the kind of points that stick up all over this dog. Take him away!"
The operator's head appeared to be gliding out of my range of vision;
then the windows of the north-bound train slid past, faster and
faster. A melancholy grace-note from the dog, a jolt, and I turned
around, appalled.
"This train is going," I stammered, "and you are on it!"
Miss Barrison sprang up and started towards the door, and I sped after
her.
"I can jump," she said, breathlessly, edging out to the platform;
"please let me! There is time yet--if you only wouldn't hold me--so
tight--"
A few moments later we walked slowly back together through the car and
took seats facing one another.
Between us sat the hound-dog, a prey to melancholy unutterable.