THE RETURN OF CANDON
Bud saw her spring up, evidently fancying some danger was upon them,
then he saw Hank seizing her and jumping her round in a sort of dance.
When he reached them, Hank had flung himself down on the sand and was
laughing.
“He’s gone crazy,” said Tommie, laughing despite herself. “Where on
earth you been?”
“Been!” cried George. “Hunting Mexico for you, thinking you were lost.
Where have _you_ been?”
“Me—only to get my book. I took the boat when you two were asleep and I
got back here a few minutes ago and found you all gone.”
“Well,” said Bud, sitting down on the sand. “I was asleep when Hank
pulled me out by the leg, saying you were gone and the Mexicans had
stolen you, then we all started off to chase them and hunt for you.”
“But didn’t you see the boat was gone?” asked she.
“I only saw you were gone,” said Hank, “and the Mexicans.”
“Hank told us they’d boned you and made off with you,” put in George.
“I took it for gospel and started right off.”
Hank snorted. “What else was a body to think. It gets me. Say, people,
what’s wrong with this cruise anyhow. Look at it.”
The idea that his own frightful imagination had not only launched the
whole expedition, but had dragged Tommie in, broken up a picture show
and wrecked a junk, to say nothing of the latter business, never dawned
on him or his companions, nor the premonition that his imagination had
not done with them yet.
“Where’s B. C.?” asked Tommie suddenly.
“Hunting away still,” replied George.
“What’s in that bundle?”
“Oh, the bundle—why it’s the boodle; the greasers must have dug it up,
for we found it in the sack on the mule.”
“The jewels!”
“Yep.”
“_My!_” said Tommie, her eyes wide and the colour coming to her cheeks.
“_Why_ didn’t you tell me?” She seized on it.
“I’ll help,” said Hank, “you’ll dirty your fingers with the string.”
“Bother my fingers.”
She had the string off and then, unwrapping the oilskin cover, came on
sack cloth. Opening this unskilfully the whole contents shot out on
her knees and the sand. Diamond rings, ten silver spoons, a diamond
necklace, blazing, huge and vulgar, a diamond hair ornament like a
tiara, a ring set with rubies, another with emeralds, a woman’s wrist
watch set with diamonds, and a silver pepper pot. Twenty or thirty
thousand dollars’ worth of plunder, at least, and shouting with
individuality. One could see the fat woman who once wore the necklace
and tiara, almost; no wonder that the pirates had determined to give
them a year to cool amidst the sands of the Bay of Whales.
“My!” said Tommie again, her eyes glittering as she gathered the things
together carefully, spread the sack cloth and put them out.
She brooded on them without another word, picking them up one by one,
trying the rings on, holding up the necklace for all to admire, even
the Chinks, who had drawn close and who seemed to understand that these
were the things for which they had been digging.
Then she put the lot on for fun, the tiara that nearly came over her
ears, the necklace that nearly came down to her waist, the rings that
hung loose on her fingers. Then, making a fan out of an old piece of
paper, she got up and promenaded the sands, gathering up imaginary
skirts and looking disdain upon her recent friends, till even the
Chinks laughed.
Then, all at once, she quitted fooling, became preternaturally grave
and, sitting down again, did the things up in the sack-cloth and oil
skin.
George thought that she heaved a sigh as she tied the string. Hank
noticed that she made a reef knot with her capable fingers and the fact
gave him another little heart punch.
“They’re worth a lot,” said George.
“Thousands and thousands of dollars,” said Tommie. “Here, take them and
hide them somewhere safe.”
Hank took the bundle. “I’m going to take them right aboard,” declared
he, “and shove them in the locker with the ship’s money. I won’t trust
them another minute on this beach.”
“Why, don’t be a fool,” said George, “we’ll all be going aboard when
Candon comes, we’ve done our work here.”
“It’s just on sundown,” said Hank, “and if he’s not here in another
half hour, we’ll have to stick the night. Can’t get all these tents
moved in the dark, and I’m not going to leave ’em. It’s ten to one
we’ll stick till morning, and I’m not going to have those jewels stay
the night with us. Something would happen sure. Maybe those greasers
would come back with more men to help them.”
“Not they. They won’t stop running till next week.”
“All the same these things have played us a good many tricks and I want
to stop their game.”
“Are you superstitious?” asked Tommie.
“Not a bit, only I’ve got a hunch that they’re better on board.”
“Oh, then, take them, take them,” said George, “if you must. And see
here, you’d better bring off those two automatics and some cartridges
in case we don’t get off to-night and those scamps make trouble.”
“Sure,” said Hank.
Off he started calling the Chinks to man the boat, whilst George and
Tommie set to and began to build the fire.
Tommie, every now and then, took a glance towards the cliffs as though
the absence of Candon were worrying her. When Hank came back he found
them seated by the fire with the supper things spread, but no Candon.
“Hasn’t B. C. come back?” asked Hank, sitting down.
“No,” replied George.
The thought that he was still hunting for Tommie and that they had
returned and were seated comfortably beginning their supper, came
not only to the pair of them, but evidently, by her manner, to Miss
Coulthurst. They tried to explain that they had come back not to give
up the hunt, but to get the Chinks to help to comb the place, but the
explanation seemed to fall rather flat.
“I hope to goodness nothing has happened to him,” said George, weakly.
“Maybe you’d better go and see,” suggested Tommie.
Hank jumped to his feet.
“Come on,” he cried. George was scrambling up also when a hail came
from towards the cliffs and they saw the figure of B. C. in the first
of the starlight, coming towards them across the sands.
He spotted the figure of Tommie long before he reached them, and
concluded that the others had found her and brought her back.
Walking like a man dead beat, he came up to them and cast himself down
to rest on the sand.
“Thank God,” said he.
“Where you been?” asked George.
“Been! Half over Mexico, kicking greasers, hunting—giv’s a drink. Say—”
to Tommie, “where did they find you?”
Tommie’s only answer was a little squirt of laughter.
“She’d never gone,” said Hank. Then he told the whole story.
Candon said nothing. Not one of them guessed the revolution that had
suddenly taken place in his dead tired mind. Beyond the bald fact that
he had made a fool of himself hunting for hours for something that was
not there, stood the truth that fate had worked things so that whenever
he moved towards a decent act he got a snub on the nose from somewhere.
His attempt to return those jewels to their proper owners had brought
the whole McGinnis crowd on top of him and had made him start on this
mad expedition; his attempts to rescue Tommie from the white slavers
had made him ridiculous, anyhow to himself; this wild search of the
last few hours had made him ridiculous in the eyes of his companions.
One thing called up another till the hell broth in his mind, the
feeling of “damn, everything” was almost complete. What completed it
was Tommie’s spurt of laughter. That was fatal.
He said nothing but began eating his supper with the rest. Then Hank,
suddenly remembering the jewels, broke out, “Say! I forgot, we’ve got
a surprise for you. I’ll give you a hundred guesses and I’ll bet you
won’t tell what it is.”
“It’s the boodle,” cut in George.
Then they told.
Candon showed neither pleasure nor surprise, he went on eating.
“Well, where is it?” said he at last.
“On the yacht,” said Hank. “I rowed over and stowed it away, just
before you came.”
“You rowed over and stowed it away. What did you do that for?”
“Safety.”
“Safety—did you expect I was going to steal it?”
“Lord! B. C.,” said Hank, “what’s getting at you?”
“Nothing,” said Candon, suddenly blazing out: “Well, as you have taken
the stuff on board, you can take it back to ’Frisco without me. The
expedition’s ended. You start off back to-morrow, I stay here. I’ve
fulfilled my part of the contract. I’ve brought Vanderdecken on board
your ship and I’ve brought you to the stuff and you’ve got it. In the
contract I was to receive so much money down. I don’t want it. I can
hoof it down to Mazatlan and get work among the Mexicans. You can leave
me one of the automatics and some cartridges, that’s all I want.”
George sat aghast; so did Hank.
It was as if B. C. had turned inside out before their eyes.
“Look here,” said George at last, “that’s nonsense. We are all good
friends. Vanderdecken has nothing to do with us or that boodle. Good
Lord! What’s come to you?”
“It’s come to me that I’m sick of the show,” said B. C. “I’ve done my
part, the expedition is over as far as I’m concerned and I stay here.
You’ll be leaving early in the morning?”
“Sun-up,” said Hank.
“Well, you can leave a couple of days’ grub for me and one of the
automatics in case I have any trouble with these fellows. That’s all,
but I’ll see you in the morning before you start.”
They saw he was in earnest and in no temper for discussion, neither of
them spoke.
Then Candon, having finished, got up and walked down to the beach.
Tommie had not said a word.
George was the first to speak.
“What ails him, what in the nation’s got into his head?”
“Search me,” said Hank, in a dreary voice, “unless it’s this
expedition. I was saying before he came back there was something wrong
with it, has been from the start. I dunno—well, here we are, and how
are we to leave him without money or anything? Why, I’ve got as fond of
that lad as if he was my own brother and he turns like that on us.”
“Maybe he’s tired,” said Tommie, “and if you talk to him in the
morning, you’ll find him different.”
“I don’t believe it,” said George, “he means what he says. Question is,
what’s turned him on us?”
“Turned him on us? Why, my taking those rotten diamonds off to the
ship—what else? I didn’t know he’d take it like that, how could I?”
“Then go and explain,” said George, “go and tell him you’re sorry.”
“Me! what’s there to be sorry for?”
“Well, it was a fool’s game, anyhow.”
“Which?”
“Carting that stuff off on board.”
“We ain’t all as clever as you, I know,” said Hank. “S’pose those
Mexicans come down to-night on us, you’ll see if it was a fool’s game
getting the valuables off first. I tell you we ought to have cleared
off this evening, it’s plain not safe sticking here the night. We
_would_ have cleared only for B. C., fooling about.”
“He was looking for me,” quietly put in Tommie.
Hank, squashed for the moment, was silent, then he said: “Well, maybe,
but there we are, in about as dangerous a fix as people could be, and
you talk of fools’ games.”
“By the way,” said George, “have you brought off those automatics?”
“Those which—automatics—Lord, no—I forgot, clean. How’s a chap to be
remembering things, running backwards and forwards from that damned
ship? Clean——”
“Well, it’s not the first thing you’ve forgotten, and if you’re so
anxious about the Mexicans, you’d better go and fetch them.”
“Me! I ain’t going to fetch and carry any more. Go yourself.”
“Pistols aren’t any use,” said Tommie, suddenly as if awaking from a
reverie. “If those people come, there’ll be so many of them it won’t be
any use firing at them and if any of them were shot, we might get into
trouble.”
“Seems to me we’re mighty near it.”
“Mighty near which?” asked a voice.
Candon had returned and was standing just outside the fire zone. He
seemed in a slightly better temper.
“Why, Hank here has forgot to bring off the automatics,” said George,
“and he’s afraid of those Mexicans coming down on us in the night.”
“Lord, I hadn’t thought of that,” said B. C. almost in his old voice.
“Well, I’ll go off and fetch them. I’ve got to fetch a couple of
things I’ve left in my locker anyway.” He turned.
“Fetch the ammunition if you’re going,” said George.
“Sure.”
They heard him calling the Chinks, then the boat put off.
“Seems he’s still bent on quitting,” said Hank.
George yawned.
If the air of the Bay of Whales could be condensed and bottled, morphia
would be a drug in the drug market. It had the two men now firmly in
its grip. They determined to turn in without waiting for B. C., and
Tommie, retiring to her tent, seemed as heavy with sleep as the others.
She was not. She did not undress but just lay down on a blanket, her
chin in the palms of her hands and gazing out on the starlit beach as
though hypnotized.
She was gazing at Candon.
He was the only man she had ever thought twice about, he was different
from the others, she could not tell how. The fact that he was
Vanderdecken did not make this difference, nor the fact that he had
picked her up and literally run away with her, nor the fact that he had
beautiful blue eyes. He was just different and she felt that she would
never meet anyone like him again.
Yet he was going to leave them. Instinctively she knew why. That
outburst when they found the cache sanded over gave her some knowledge
of his temperament; and the fact that he had almost killed himself
hunting for her gave her some hint of his care for her. And she had
laughed at him.
She remembered how he had said: “Thank God!” on finding her safe.
She rose and came out of the tent on to the sands. She had come to the
determination that if he stayed behind here on the morrow, it would not
be her fault, and, coming down to the sea edge, she sat down on the
beach to wait for the returning boat.
The sound of the waves on the long beach came mixed with the breath
of the sea. The reefs spoke sometimes and the wind, blowing from the
north-west, stirred the sand with a silken whispering sound that would
die off to nothing and then return.
Sometimes she fancied that she could hear the creak of oars, and,
rising, strained her eyes to catch a glimpse of the coming boat.
Nothing. She could not see the anchor light of the _Wear Jack_ owing to
the faint sea haze, and taking her seat again on the sands, she resumed
her watch whilst the time passed and the stars moved and the tide went
further out.
Then she rose. Candon was evidently remaining for the night on the
_Wear Jack_; there was no use in waiting longer. Still she waited,
standing and looking out to sea.
At last, she turned and came back to the tents.
She would see him in the morning, but the others would be there. It
would be quite different then. The moment had passed and gone, and
would not return.
Arrived at her tent, she undressed and got into her pyjamas and crawled
under a blanket which she pulled over her head. Then, safely hidden,
and with her face in the crook of her arm, she sniveled and sobbed,
remembered she had not said her prayers and said them, sniffed some
more and fell asleep. Poor Tommie. She did not know what she wanted but
she knew she wanted it. She felt she had lost something but she did not
know it was her heart.