In his strange mental condition even the change from Harkutt's feeble
candle to the outer darkness for a moment blinded Elijah Curtis, yet it
was part of that mental condition that he kept moving steadily forward
as in a trance or dream, though at first purposelessly. Then it occurred
to him that he was really looking for his horse, and that the animal was
not there. This for a moment confused and frightened him, first with the
supposition that he had not brought him at all, but that it was part of
his delusion; secondly, with the conviction that without his horse
he could neither proceed on the course suggested by Harkutt, nor take
another more vague one that was dimly in his mind. Yet in his hopeless
vacillation it seemed a relief that now neither was practicable, and
that he need do nothing. Perhaps it was a mysterious providence!
The explanation, however, was much simpler. The horse had been taken by
the luxurious and indolent Billings unknown to his companions. Overcome
at the dreadful prospect of walking home in that weather, this perfect
product of lethargic Sidon had artfully allowed Peters and Wingate to
precede him, and, cautiously unloosing the tethered animal, had safely
passed them in the darkness. When he gained his own inclosure he had
lazily dismounted, and, with a sharp cut on the mustang's haunches,
sent him galloping back to rejoin his master, with what result has been
already told by the unsuspecting Peters in the preceding chapter.
Yet no conception of this possibility entered 'Lige Curtis's alcoholized
consciousness, part of whose morbid phantasy it was to distort or
exaggerate all natural phenomena. He had a vague idea that he could not
go back to Harkutt's; already his visit seemed to have happened long,
long ago, and could not be repeated. He would walk on, enwrapped in
this uncompromising darkness which concealed everything, suggested
everything, and was responsible for everything.
It was very dark, for the wind, having lulled, no longer thinned the
veil of clouds above, nor dissipated a steaming mist that appeared to
rise from the sodden plain. Yet he moved easily through the darkness,
seeming to be upheld by it as something tangible, upon which he might
lean. At times he thought he heard voices,--not a particular voice he
was thinking of, but strange voices--of course unreal to his present
fancy. And then he heard one of these voices, unlike any voice in
Sidon, and very faint and far off, asking if it “was anywhere near
Sidon?”--evidently some one lost like himself. He answered in a voice
that seemed quite as unreal and as faint, and turned in the direction
from which it came. There was a light moving like a will-o'-the-wisp far
before him, yet below him as if coming out of the depths of the earth.
It must be fancy, but he would see--ah!
He had fallen violently forward, and at the same moment felt his
revolver leap from his breast pocket like a living thing, and an instant
after explode upon the rock where it struck, blindingly illuminating the
declivity down which he was plunging. The sulphurous sting of burning
powder was in his eyes and nose, yet in that swift revealing flash he
had time to clutch the stems of a trailing vine beside him, but not
to save his head from sharp contact with the same rocky ledge that had
caught his pistol. The pain and shock gave way to a sickening sense of
warmth at the roots of his hair. Giddy and faint, his fingers relaxed,
he felt himself sinking, with a languor that was half acquiescence,
down, down,--until, with another shock, a wild gasping for air, and a
swift reaction, he awoke in the cold, rushing water!
Clear and perfectly conscious now, though frantically fighting for
existence with the current, he could dimly see a floating black object
shooting by the shore, at times striking the projections of the bank,
until in its recoil it swung half round and drifted broadside on towards
him. He was near enough to catch the frayed ends of a trailing rope that
fastened the structure, which seemed to be a few logs, together. With
a convulsive effort he at last gained a footing upon it, and then fell
fainting along its length. It was the raft which the surveyors from the
embarcadero had just abandoned.
He did not know this, nor would he have thought it otherwise strange
that a raft might be a part of the drift of the overflow, even had he
been entirely conscious; but his senses were failing, though he was
still able to keep a secure position on the raft, and to vaguely believe
that it would carry him to some relief and succor. How long he lay
unconscious he never knew; in his after-recollections of that night, it
seemed to have been haunted by dreams of passing dim banks and strange
places; of a face and voice that had been pleasant to him; of a terror
coming upon him as he appeared to be nearing a place like that home that
he had abandoned in the lonely tules. He was roused at last by a violent
headache, as if his soft felt hat had been changed into a tightening
crown of iron. Lifting his hand to his head to tear off its covering,
he was surprised to find that he was wearing no hat, but that his matted
hair, stiffened and dried with blood and ooze, was clinging like a cap
to his skull in the hot morning sunlight. His eyelids and lashes were
glued together and weighted down by the same sanguinary plaster. He
crawled to the edge of his frail raft, not without difficulty, for it
oscillated and rocked strangely, and dipped his hand in the current.
When he had cleared his eyes he lifted them with a shock of amazement.
Creeks, banks, and plain had disappeared; he was alone on a bend of the
tossing bay of San Francisco!
His first and only sense--cleared by fasting and quickened by
reaction--was one of infinite relief. He was not only free from the
vague terrors of the preceding days and nights, but his whole past
seemed to be lost and sunk forever in this illimitable expanse. The low
plain of Tasajara, with its steadfast monotony of light and shadow,
had sunk beneath another level, but one that glistened, sparkled, was
instinct with varying life, and moved and even danced below him. The low
palisades of regularly recurring tules that had fenced in, impeded, but
never relieved the blankness of his horizon, were forever swallowed
up behind him. All trail of past degradation, all record of pain and
suffering, all footprints of his wandering and misguided feet were
smoothly wiped out in that obliterating sea. He was physically helpless,
and he felt it; he was in danger, and he knew it,--but he was free!
Happily there was but little wind and the sea was slight. The raft was
still intact so far as he could judge, but even in his ignorance he
knew it would scarcely stand the surges of the lower bay. Like most
Californians who had passed the straits of Carquinez at night in a
steamer, he did not recognize the locality, nor even the distant peak
of Tamalpais. There were a few dotting sails that seemed as remote,
as uncertain, and as unfriendly as sea birds. The raft was motionless,
almost as motionless as he was in his cramped limbs and sun-dried,
stiffened clothes. Too weak to keep an upright position, without mast,
stick, or oar to lift a signal above that vast expanse, it seemed
impossible for him to attract attention. Even his pistol was gone.
Suddenly, in an attempt to raise himself, he was struck by a flash so
blinding that it seemed to pierce his aching eyes and brain and turned
him sick. It appeared to come from a crevice between the logs at the
further end of the raft. Creeping painfully towards it he saw that it
was a triangular slip of highly polished metal that he had hitherto
overlooked. He did not know that it was a “flashing” mirror used
in topographical observation, which had slipped from the surveyors'
instruments when they abandoned the raft, but his excited faculties
instinctively detected its value to him. He lifted it, and, facing the
sun, raised it at different angles with his feeble arms. But the effort
was too much for him; the raft presently seemed to be whirling with his
movement, and he again fell.
*****
“Ahoy there!”
The voice was close upon--in his very ears. He opened his eyes. The sea
still stretched emptily before him; the dotting sails still unchanged
and distant. Yet a strange shadow lay upon the raft. He turned his head
with difficulty. On the opposite side--so close upon him as to be almost
over his head--the great white sails of a schooner hovered above him
like the wings of some enormous sea bird. Then a heavy boom swung across
the raft, so low that it would have swept him away had he been in an
upright position; the sides of the vessel grazed the raft and she fell
slowly off. A terrible fear of abandonment took possession of him; he
tried to speak, but could not. The vessel moved further away, but the
raft followed! He could see now it was being held by a boat-hook,--could
see the odd, eager curiosity on two faces that were raised above
the taffrail, and with that sense of relief his eyes again closed in
unconsciousness.
A feeling of chilliness, followed by a grateful sensation of drawing
closer under some warm covering, a stinging taste in his mouth of fiery
liquor and the aromatic steam of hot coffee, were his first returning
sensations. His head and neck were swathed in coarse bandages, and his
skin stiffened and smarting with soap. He was lying in a rude berth
under a half-deck from which he could see the sky and the bellying sail,
and presently a bearded face filled with rough and practical concern
that peered down upon him.
“Hulloo! comin' round, eh? Hold on!” The next moment the stranger had
leaped down beside Elijah. He seemed to be an odd mingling of the sailor
and ranchero with the shrewdness of a seaport trader.
“Hulloo, boss! What was it? A free fight, or a wash-out?”
“A wash-out!”* Elijah grasped the idea as an inspiration. Yes, his cabin
had been inundated, he had taken to a raft, had been knocked off twice
or thrice, and had lost everything--even his revolver!
* A mining term for the temporary inundation of a claim by
flood; also used for the sterilizing effect of flood on
fertile soil.
The man looked relieved. “Then it ain't a free fight, nor havin' your
crust busted and bein' robbed by beach combers, eh?”
“No,” said Elijah, with his first faint smile.
“Glad o' that,” said the man bluntly. “Then thar ain't no police
business to tie up to in 'Frisco? We were stuck thar a week once, just
because we chanced to pick up a feller who'd been found gagged and then
thrown overboard by wharf thieves. Had to dance attendance at court
thar and lost our trip.” He stopped and looked half-pathetically at the
prostrate Elijah. “Look yer! ye ain't just dyin' to go ashore NOW and
see yer friends and send messages, are ye?”
Elijah shuddered inwardly, but outwardly smiled faintly as he replied,
“No!”
“And the tide and wind jest servin' us now, ye wouldn't mind keepin'
straight on with us this trip?”
“Where to?” asked Elijah.
“Santy Barbara.”
“No,” said Elijah, after a moment's pause. “I'll go with you.”
The man leaped to his feet, lifted his head above the upper deck,
shouted “Let her go free, Jerry!” and then turned gratefully to his
passenger. “Look yer! A wash-out is a wash-out, I reckon, put it any
way you like; it don't put anything back into the land, or anything back
into your pocket afterwards, eh? No! And yer well out of it, pardner!
Now there's a right smart chance for locatin' jest back of Santy
Barbara, where thar ain't no God-forsaken tules to overflow; and ez far
ez the land and licker lies ye 'needn't take any water in yours' ef ye
don't want it. You kin start fresh thar, pardner, and brail up. What's
the matter with you, old man, is only fever 'n' agur ketched in them
tules! I kin see it in your eyes. Now you hold on whar you be till I go
forrard and see everything taut, and then I'll come back and we'll have
a talk.”
And they did. The result of which was that at the end of a week's
tossing and seasickness, Elijah Curtis was landed at Santa Barbara,
pale, thin, but self-contained and resolute. And having found favor
in the eyes of the skipper of the Kitty Hawk, general trader,
lumber-dealer, and ranch-man, a week later he was located on the
skipper's land and installed in the skipper's service. And from that
day, for five years Sidon and Tasajara knew him no more.