To watch the little "reef girl" among her flowers on the bleached,
barren coral key was good for the eyes, and more interesting even than
the startling information I got out of the Scotch engineer who had
been in the employ of Bulow & Co. for five years. I believed my find
so important that I was willing to buy Black and White as long as he
would stand it or do anything else to keep his tongue wagging, but
this was not a hard task. He felt injured, his loyalty and pride were
touched--I only needed to rub the sore spots.
"Scotty, have you been discharged?"
"No, siree; I never was fired in me life," said he, stoutly, his
natural caution oozing away.
"But you are thinking of quitting and going back to the Royal Navy?"
"That I am. The Old Highland is attacked, and I'm afraid by such
people as this very scum that's paying me now. I'm going to chance
telling ye. I begin to think there's something rotten here," said he
grimly, with the stoic anger of a Highlander examining his weapons
before a mêlée chancing his life. I pushed the bottle his way again.
"Scotty, are you willing to open up?"
"Yes--try me."
"Well, it's important for me to know the movement and cargo of all
Bulow and Company's ships, tugs and launches. Doing that is a thousand
times more valuable than watching steam gauges in His Majesty's Navy."
A shrewd look came over Scotty's face. He placed a bony forefinger
solemnly alongside his nose and his small eyes danced in anticipation.
"Have you got a wireless on your launch?" I began.
"No."
"The big steamers have?"
"Yes, all of them."
"Has Bulow and Company a private station anywhere?"
"I think they must have, or they couldn't know so much about the big
ships coming in."
"Good! Now, Scotty, I'm going up to the Keys in the morning, and I'll
be down on the dock to-morrow night looking for work again. Stick to
your job and see what you can tuck in behind those lamps betimes," I
said, edging out of the side door. I felt pretty sure of Scotty. My
last glance into his eyes reassured me.
With Ike Barry's catalog, as big as an unabridged, the train stopped
again at Canby's the next morning to let me off.
The little girl, evidently expecting me, smiled from behind a bank of
geraniums--a natural, honest, sweet smile. Her face, framed by the
flowers, I will remember forever.
"You see I am here as I promised," said I, saluting, and went down
from the veranda to her among the flowers. She seemed delighted and
held out her dainty hand.
"I knew you would come!--and I told Daddy," she exclaimed. "He had to
leave in the night again, but he told me to order everything we needed
and give you the money," she said simply, with almost a sad look
replacing her smile of welcome, at the same time watching the train
grow smaller and smaller as it sped toward the Everglades and the
Northland, as much a mystery to her as the life to come. Then she
resumed digging about the geraniums.
"How were you guided in laying out your flower beds? There is a
disorder about them that finally appeals."
"Oh, yes; I understand what you mean," she replied after hesitation.
"Well--this end looks like a little room in Nereid." Her eyes were
dreamy as she straightened up.
"Nereid--Nereid----" I encouraged, "why, Nereids are of the sea.
Belong to Neptune. Is that why----"
"Maybe so; Daddy named it and he has good reasons for everything. He
knows so much."
"But you didn't tell me where Nereid is."
"Oh, yes," she replied absently, as if arousing herself from a dream.
"Nereid is in the water,--a heavenly place. I found it about fifty
feet down. It's a great, big cave with an entrance so small that even
after Daddy blasted it with a 'terror' I could only wriggle in."
"What is a 'terror'?" I asked, wondering if she was really dreaming or
was possessed of a delightful talent for romancing.
"That's one of Daddy's inventions and we sell lots of them to the
spongers. It's a stick of dynamite with a grabhook on it so it can be
fastened to most anything and not wash away. A wire is attached so
that it may be fired from the boat after the spongers come up. I will
show you one inside. You see," she explained, "rocks and coral down
there are in the way of getting the best sponges."
"How far is the Nereid?"
"It takes the _Titian_," said she, looking at the big launch at anchor
beyond the warehouse, "about an hour to go there. You know, the bottom
of the sea is much more beautiful than the land--the land around here
anyway--it's even more beautiful than my flowers. It has great
valleys, cliffs, caves and forests, all kinds of varicolored trees,
all for the fish, and the sponge divers are the only people who ever
see them. Daddy says one place is five miles deep. Oh, I would like to
go down there, but I can't."
"Tell me more about Nereid. I am anxious to know."
"Oh, yes. After I could get in we got the most wonderful sponges and I
would hand them out to Daddy. We went there for months and I was glad.
I love to go and always hated to leave, for it was such a beautiful
place. You see, I got so I could stay down longer than Daddy and the
sharks could not get in and so I would just rest. Sharks are bad here
and we have to keep moving every second or they attack. I could see a
light there, but it was not like the sun. It made everything in the
cave so bright and I could hear music at times that made me dream. It
was heavenly. There were gold, green and other colors I can't
describe, the sides and roof looked like diamonds and colored stones I
never saw before. The long halls and rooms farther back I was unable
to enter."
"Your father was never able to get into Nereid?"
"No; that's why he won't let me go any more. I would stay so long he
would have to give me oxygen to bring me to. Then the beautiful things
and music would become plainer and I hoped I never would come out. I
would imagine I was in the North country about which Daddy tells me,
where you live, where everyone hears sweet music, thousands of voices
singing, a long way off but plainly. I--I thought my mother was among
them. I imagined I saw rows of wonderful books, and pretty pictures,
beautiful women, and grand-looking men all dressed up who knew
everything--isn't that the way things are in great cities, with fine
houses, tall buildings that reach the sky, and beautiful parks?"
This question was asked pleadingly, revealing a deep longing for the
big world outside, a world of mystery to her, "but maybe it was only a
dream," she added, with a plaintive little sigh.
"Yes, the world is full of good men and women and beautiful things, if
we see them rightly," I replied, as I walked beside her to the steps
of the veranda, marveling at her simplicity. "I think you must have a
wonderful father," I concluded, as we went up the steps.
"Oh, he is indeed; we talk so much about everything and especially
about the time I must leave him and go to school. I will be so
lonesome for him--I do so love my Daddy. But if you are to get that
train, the same as yesterday, I will have to hurry, as there are a lot
of things we need to order."
"Why does your father go away so early? Does he do that every day?" I
asked, getting Ike Barry's catalog and opening it on the veranda
table.
"Yes, about. You see, several years ago he had an accident. A shark
charged him just as he was coming up, tired, to rest a moment. I saw
the shark just in time, dived and ripped him open with my knife but he
got Daddy's knee in his mouth, anyhow. It was so stiff he couldn't
swim much and he wouldn't let me go down alone. So we added to the
store and got more goods. Then Daddy persuaded all the sponge men to
fish for sharks and porpoise, and shoot 'gators, the hides and skins
being worth so much more now. Then, instead of selling them green, he
started a place away up the country in the woods, where he tans and
then sells the leather. Then he buys sponges and sells them, too.
That's what keeps him so busy. I will show you some of the leather
down in the warehouse when we're through. I'll go and get the list of
goods Daddy and I made out last night."
I was puzzled indeed. This child was frankness itself. She, very
likely, talked and thought in the same terms as her father, from long
and constant companionship. There was no evidence of anything to
conceal. I felt sure he was not smuggling or in contraband trade. As I
walked about the veranda, waiting for her, I noticed for the first
time what appeared to be a very old and battered wreck, barely
visible, lying behind the coral reef that protected the little harbor.
"You have had a wreck here, I see?" I observed enquiringly, as she
returned with the list.
"Oh, yes. That's been there longer than I can remember. We have some
awful hurricanes at times coming in from the Gulf, and as they come up
so quickly the spongers get caught once in a while," she replied,
taking a chair opposite me at the table, ready to read her list.
"That's why we need such fast boats--to race for shelter. My boat, the
_Titian_, is very swift. I can even pass the _Sprite_, Daddy's big,
new boat. You see, he gave me the _Titian_ when he got the _Sprite_.
The _Sprite_ is much bigger, but I can beat it," she chatted,
laughingly recalling the fun they had racing.
I started at the first page of Ike's catalog, and ended up at the
last. The little thing gave me a long order, I was afraid too much,
amounting to more than they would be able to pay. But I was mistaken.
When through she asked me to tell her how much it was. It took me a
long time to total it for it was new to me. I told her it was over
four thousand dollars, watching for a big surprise.
Not so. She staggered me. She got pen and ink and made out the check
Canby had signed and gave it to me, also shipping directions; when I
looked at the check it was on one of the very large banks in downtown
New York.
But my hardest work was to come. I wanted a peep in the warehouse,
that interested Bulow and Company so much, and was afraid she would
forget her promise to show me the sharkskin leather. But she didn't.
She got a key from the store and as we walked down the wharf she
talked of the North, and how she longed to go to school, every time
coming back to the fact that she hated to leave Daddy.
Once in the warehouse, I discovered it was much larger than it
appeared from outside. What I saw amazed me. Sharkskins, tanned as
white as snow and soft as fine kid, were piled, with various sizes
together, higher than my head; porpoise, as thick as elephant's hide,
were stacked to the cross beams. Tanned alligator hides, arranged also
in sizes, filled half the warehouse. There must have been tens of
thousands of dollars' worth. Keenly delighted at her father's
achievements, she told me about each kind and for what purpose they
were used.
In one corner were a lot of tanned sharkskins individually rolled and
bound securely with sisal cords. They seemed extra heavy as they laid
there in a big pile. I passed my hand over them. Evidently they were
wrapping something very heavy, ingots of lead or copper.
"That's the way he ties them up for shipping so they won't take much
room," she volunteered, noting my interest, and I wondered if she was
as innocent as she seemed of their contents.
"Do you feel safe with such valuables around? This warehouse is only
corrugated iron," I suggested. My intention was to lead up to the
visit of the Bulow boat, and the subsequent shooting.
"Well"--she hesitated as though recalling a discussion with her
father--"the fishermen are all honest. As rough as they are, they
would not take a pin. We have never been bothered at all, except
once--just lately."
I encouraged her by arching my brows inquiringly.
"One morning I was in my room that faces this way, cleaning my rifle.
Don was over on the other side of the reef skinning a 'gator I had
just shot, when I noticed a big cutter swing up with three men. Two
got out and came in the store. I was going down at first, but somehow
I stayed at the top of the stairs and listened. They talked awfully
rough, and at the same time were looking all over the place. They went
out to the warehouse and the fat man tried to pry off the padlock,
and kept on trying. I didn't want to hurt him, but he had no right to
break in, so I shot him through the hand. I hoped I had just
frightened him, but blood spots were found on the wharf after they got
in their boat to go away. Father said I did just right," she ended, in
a dubious tone.
I now saw the train coming, and had to hurry, telling her I hoped to
see her again. As I swung on board she stood watching and waving her
hand with a longing, wistful expression.