"'Three days ago I was in my office, waiting to see a man to whom I hoped
to sell my stock of guano, when a man came in,--but not the one I
expected to see,--and if a ghost had appeared before me, I could not have
been more surprised. I do not know whether or not you remember the two
American sailors who were the first to go out prospecting, after Mr.
Rynders and his men left us, and who did not return. This man was one of
them--Edward Shirley by name.'"

"I remember him perfectly!" cried Ralph. "And the other fellow was George
Burke. On board the _Castor_ I used to talk to them more than to any of
the other sailors."

"'But astonished as I was,'" Edna went on to read, "'Shirley did not seem
at all surprised, but came forward and shook hands most heartily. He said
he had read in a newspaper that I had been rescued, and was doing
business in Acapulco, and he had come down on purpose to find me. I told
him how we had given up him and his mate for lost, and then, as he had
read a very slim account of our adventures, I told him the whole story,
taking great care, as you may guess, not to say anything about the
treasure mound. He did not ask any questions as to why I did not come
back with the rest of you, but was greatly troubled when he heard of the
murders of every man of our crew except himself and Burke and Maka.

"'When I had finished, he told me his story, which I will condense as
much as possible. When he and Burke started out, they first began to
make their way along the slope of the rocky ridge which ended in our
caves, but they found this very hard work, so they soon went down to the
sandy country to the north. Here they shot some little beast or other,
and while they were hunting another one, up hill and down dale, they
found night was coming on, and they were afraid to retrace their steps
for fear they might come to trouble in the darkness. So they ate what
they had with them, and camped, and the next morning the mountains to the
east seemed to be so near them that they thought it much easier to push
on instead of coming back to us. They thought that when they got to the
fertile country they would find a settlement, and then they might be able
to do something for the rest of the party, and it would be much wiser to
go ahead than to turn back. But they found themselves greatly mistaken.
Mountains in the distance, seen over a plain, appear very much nearer
than they are, and these two poor fellows walked and walked, until they
were pretty nearly dead. The story is a long one as Shirley told it to
me, but just as they were about giving up entirely, they were found by a
little party of natives, who had seen them from a long distance and had
come to them.

"'After a great deal of trouble,--I believe they had to carry Burke a
good part of the way,--the natives got them to their huts at the foot of
the mountains, and took care of them. These people told Shirley--he knows
a little Spanish--that it was a piece of rare good luck that they found
them, for it was very seldom they went so far out into the desert.

"'In a day or two the two men went on to a little village in the
mountains, and there they tried to get up an expedition to come to our
assistance. They knew that we had food enough to last for a week or two,
but after that we must be starved out. But nobody would do anything, and
then they went on to another town to see what they could do there.'"

"Good fellows!" exclaimed Ralph.

"Indeed, they were," said Edna. "But wait until you hear what they did
next.

"'Nobody in this small town,'" she read on, "'was willing to join Burke
and Shirley in their proposed expedition, and no wonder; for crossing
those deserts is a dangerous thing, and most people said it would be
useless anyway, as it would be easier for us to get away by sea than by
land. At this time Burke was taken sick, and for a week or two Shirley
thought he was going to die. Of course, they had to stay where they were,
and it was a long time before Burke was able to move about. Then they
might have gone into the interior until they came to a railroad, and so
have got away, for they had money with them, but Shirley told me they
could not bear to do that without knowing what had become of us. They did
not believe there was any hope for us, unless the mate had come back with
assistance, and they had not much faith in that, for if a storm had come
up, such as had wrecked the Castor, it would be all over with Mr.
Rynders's boat.

"'But even if we had perished on that desolate coast, they wanted to
know it and carry the news to our friends, and so they both determined,
if the thing could be done, to get back to the coast and find out what
had become of us. They went again to the little village where they had
been taken by the natives who found them, and there, by promises of big
pay,--at least, large for those poor Peruvians,--they induced six of
them to join in an expedition to the caves. They did not think they had
any reason to suppose they would find any one alive, but still, besides
the provisions necessary for the party there and back, they carried
something extra.

"'Well, they journeyed for two days, and then there came up a
wind-storm, hot and dry, filling the air with sand and dust, so that
they could not see where they were going, and the natives said they
ought all to go back, for it was dangerous to try to keep on in such a
storm. But our two men would not give up so soon, and they made a camp
in a sheltered place, and determined to press on in the morning, when
they might expect the storm to be over. But in the morning they found
that every native had deserted them. The wind had gone down, and the
fellows must have started back before it was light. Then Shirley and
Burke did not know what to do. They believed that they were nearer the
coast than the mountains, and as they had plenty of provisions,--for the
natives had left them nearly everything,--they thought they would try to
push on, for a while at least.

"'There was a bit of rising ground to the east, and they thought if they
could get on the top of that they might get a sight of the ocean, and
then discover how far away it was. They reached the top of the rising
ground, and they did not see the ocean, but a little ahead of them, in a
smooth stretch of sand, was something which amazed them a good deal more
than if it had been the sea. It was a pair of shoes sticking up out of
the sand. They were an old pair, and appeared to have legs to them. They
went to the spot, and found that these shoes belonged to a man who was
entirely covered by sand, with the exception of his feet, and dead, of
course. They got the sand off of him, and found he was a white man, in
sailor's clothes. First they had thought he might be one of our party,
but they soon perceived that this was a mistake, for they had never seen
the man before. He was dried up until he was nothing but a skeleton with
skin over it, but they could have recognized him if they had known him
before. From what they had heard of the rainless climate of the Peruvian
coast, and the way it had of drying up dead animals of all sorts, they
imagined that this man might have been there for years. He was lying on
his back, with his arms folded around a bundle, and when they tried to
move this bundle, they found it was very heavy. It was something wrapped
up in a blanket and tied with a cord, and when they opened the bundle,
they were pretty nearly struck dumb; for they saw it held, as Shirley
expressed it, about a peck of little hunks of gold.

"'They were utterly astounded by this discovery, and utterly unable to
make head or tail of it. What that man, apparently an English sailor, had
been doing out in the middle of this desert with a bundle of gold, and
where he got it, and who he was, and where he was going to, and how long
he had been dead, were things beyond their guessing. They dragged the
body out of its burrow in the sand, and examined the pockets, but there
was nothing in the trousers but an old knife. In the pocket of the shirt,
however, were about a dozen matches, wrapped up in an old envelope. This
was addressed, in a very bad hand, to A. McLeish, Callao, Peru, but they
could not make out the date of the postmark. These things were all there
was about the man that could possibly identify him, for his few clothes
were such as any sailor would wear, and were very old and dirty.

"'But the gold was there. They examined it and scraped it, and they were
sure it was pure gold. There was no doubt in their minds as to what they
would do about this. They would certainly carry it away with them. But
before they did so, Burke wanted to hunt around and see if they could not
find more of it, for the mass of metal was so heavy he did not believe
the sailor could have carried it very far. But after examining the
country as far as the eye could reach, Shirley would not agree to this.
They could see nothing but wide-stretching sands, and no place where it
seemed worth while to risk their lives hunting for treasure. Their best
plan was to get away with what they had found, and now the point was
whether or not they should press on to the coast or go back; but as they
could see no signs of the sea, they soon came to the conclusion that the
best thing to do if they wanted to save their lives and their treasure
was to get back to the mountains.

"'I forgot to say that as soon as Shirley began to talk about the dead
man and his gold, I left the warehouse in charge of Maka, and took him to
my hotel, where he told me the rest of his story in a room with the door
locked. I must try to take as many reefs in what followed as I can. I
don't believe that the finding of the gold made any difference in their
plans, for, of course, it would have been foolish for them to try to get
to us by themselves. They cut the blanket in half and made up the gold
into two packages, and then they started back for the mountains, taking
with them all the provisions they could carry in addition to the gold,
and leaving their guns behind them. Shirley said their loads got heavier
and heavier as they ploughed through the sand, and it took them three
days to cover the ground they had gone over before in two. When they got
to the village, they found scarcely a man in the place, for the fellows
who had deserted them were frightened, and kept out of sight. They stayed
there all night, and then they went on with their bundles to the next
village, where they succeeded in getting a couple of travelling-bags,
into which they put their gold, so that they might appear to be carrying
their clothes.

"'After a good deal of travel they reached Callao, and there they made
inquiries for A. McLeish, but nobody knew of him. Of course, he was a
sailor who had had a letter sent there. They went up to Lima and sold a
few pieces of the gold, but, before they did it, they got a heavy hammer
and pounded them up, so that no one would know what their original shape
was. Shirley said he could not say exactly why they did this, but that
they thought, on the whole, it would be safer. Then they went to San
Francisco on the first vessel that sailed. They must have had a good deal
of talk on the voyage in regard to the gold, and it was in consequence of
their discussions that Shirley wanted so much to find me. They had
calculated, judging by the pieces they had sold, that the gold they had
with them was worth about twelve thousand dollars, and they both thought
they ought to do the right thing about it. In the first place, they tried
in San Francisco to find out something about McLeish, but no one knew of
such a man. They then began to consider some persons they did know about.
They had heard in Lima that some of the people of the _Castor_ had been
rescued, and if any of them were hard up, as most likely they were,
Shirley and Burke thought that by rights they ought to have some of the
treasure that they had found. Shirley said at first they had gone on the
idea that each of them would have six thousand dollars and could go into
business for himself, but after a while they thought this would be a mean
thing to do. They had all been shipwrecked together, and two of them had
had a rare piece of good luck, and they thought it no more than honorable
to share this good luck with the others, so they concluded the best thing
to do was to see me about it. Burke left this business to Shirley,
because he wanted to go to see his sister who lives in St. Louis.

"'They had not formed any fixed plan of division, but they believed that,
as they had had the trouble, and, in fact, the danger, of getting the
gold, they should have the main share, but they considered that they had
enough to help out any of the original party who might be hard up for
money." Of course, we must always remember," said Shirley, in finishing
up his story, "that if we can find the heirs of McLeish, the money
belongs to them. But, even in that case, Burke and I think we ought to
keep a good share of it to pay us for getting it away from that beastly
desert." Here I interrupted him. "Don't you trouble yourself any more
about McLeish," I said. "That money did not belong to him. He stole it."
"How do you know that, and who did he steal it from?" cried Shirley.
"He stole it from me," said I.

"'At this point Shirley gave such a big jump backward that his chair
broke beneath him, and he went crashing to the floor. He had made a start
a good deal like that when I told him how the Rackbirds had been swept
out of existence when I had opened the flood-gate that let out the waters
of the lake, and I had heard the chair crack then. Now, while he had been
telling me about his finding that man in the sand, with his load of gold,
I had been listening, but I had also been thinking, and almost any man
can think faster than another one can talk, and so by this time I had
made up my mind what I was going to say to Shirley. I would tell him all
about my finding the gold in the mound. It touched me to think that these
poor fellows, who did all that they could to help us escape, and then,
when they got safely home, started immediately to find us in order that
they might give us some of that paltry twelve thousand dollars--give to
us, who are actually millionaires, and who may be richer yet! It would
not do to let any of the crew get ahead of their captain in fair dealing,
and that was one reason why I determined to tell him. Then, there was
another point. Ever since I have been here, selling and storing the gold
I brought away, I have had a heavy load on my mind, and that was the
thought of leaving all the rest of the gold in that mound for the next
person who might come along and find it.

"'I devised plan after plan of getting more of it, but none of them would
work. Two things were certain: One was that I could not get any more away
by myself. I had already done the best I could and all I could in that
line. And the second thing was that if I should try for any more of the
treasure, I must have people to help me. The plan that suited me best was
to buy a small vessel, man it, go down there, load up with the gold, and
sail away. There would be no reasonable chance that any one would be
there to hinder me, and I would take in the cargo just as if it were
guano, or anything else. Then I would go boldly to Europe. I have looked
into the matter, and I have found that the best thing I can do, if I
should get that gold, would be to transport it to Paris, where I could
distribute it better than I could from any other point. But the trouble
was, where could I get the crew to help me? I have four black men, and I
think I could trust them, as far as honesty goes, but they would not be
enough to work the ship, and I could not think of any white men with whom
I would trust my life and that gold in the same vessel. But now they
seemed to pop up right in front of me.

"'I knew Shirley and Burke pretty well when they were on the _Castor_,
and after what Shirley told me I knew them better, and I believed they
were my men. To be sure, they might fail me, for they are only human, but
I had to have somebody to help me, and I did not believe there were any
other two men who would be less likely to fail me. So by the time Shirley
had finished his yarn I was ready to tell him the whole thing, and
propose to him and Burke to join me in going down after the rest of the
treasure and taking it to France.'"

At this point Ralph sprang to his feet, his eyes flashing. "Edna!" he
cried, "I say that your Captain Horn is treating me shamefully. In the
first place, he let me come up here to dawdle about, doing nothing, when
I ought to have been down there helping him get more of that treasure. I
fancy he might have trusted me, and if I had been with him, we should
have brought away nearly twice as much gold, and at this minute we
should be twice as well off as we are. But this last is a thousand times
worse. Here he is, going off on one of the most glorious adventures of
this century, and he leaves me out. What does he take me for? Does he
think I am a girl? When he was thinking of somebody to go with him, why
didn't he think of me, and why doesn't he think of me now? He has no
right to leave me out!"

"I look at the matter in a different light," said his sister. "Captain
Horn has no right to take you off on such a dangerous adventure, and,
more than that, he has no right to take you from me, and leave me alone
in the world. He once made you the guardian of all that treasure, and now
he considers you as my guardian. You did not desert the first trust, and
I am sorry to think you want to desert the other."

"That's all very fine," said Ralph. "You blow hot and you blow cold at
the same time. When you want me to keep quiet and do what I am told, you
tell me I am not of age, and that you are my guardian; and when you want
me to stay here and make myself useful, you tell me I am wonderfully
trusty, and that I must be your guardian."

Edna smiled. "That is pretty good reasoning," she said, "but there isn't
any reasoning needed in this case. No matter what Captain Horn may say or
do, I would not let you go away from me."

Ralph sat down again. "There is some sense in what you say," he said. "If
the captain should come to grief, and I were with him, we would both be
gone. Then you would have nobody left to you. But that does not entirely
clear him. Even if he thought I ought not to go with him, he ought to
have said something about it, and put in a word or so about his being
sorry. Is there any more of the letter?"

"Yes," said Edna, "there is more of it," and she began to read again:

"'I intended to stop here and give you the rest of the matter in another
letter, but now, as I have a good chance to write, I think it is better
to keep on, although this letter is already as long as the pay-roll of
the navy. When I told Shirley about the gold, he made a bounce pretty
nearly as big as the others, but this time I had him in a stout
arm-chair, and he did no damage. He had in his pocket one of the gold
bars he spoke of, and I had one of mine in my trunk, and when we put them
together they were as like as two peas. What I told him dazed him at
first, and he did not seem properly to understand what it all meant, but,
after a little, a fair view of it came to him, and for hours we talked
over the matter. Who the man was who had gone there after we left did not
matter, for he could never come hack again.

"'We decided that what we should do was to go and get that gold as soon
as possible, and Shirley agreed to go with me. He believed we could trust
Burke to join us, and, with my four black men,--who have really become
good sailors,--we would have a crew of seven men altogether, with which
we could work a fair-sized brig to Havre or some other French port.
Before he went away our business was settled. He agreed to go with me as
first mate, to do his best to help me get that gold to France, to
consider the whole treasure as mine, because I had discovered it,--I
explained the reason to him, as I did to you,--and to accept as regular
pay one hundred dollars a day, from then until we should land the cargo
in a European port, and then to leave it to me how much more I would give
him. I told him there were a lot of people to be considered, and I was
going to try to make the division as fair as possible, and he said he was
willing to trust it to me.

"'If we did not get the gold, he was to have eighteen dollars a month
for the time he sailed with me, and if we got safely back, I would give
him his share of what I had already secured. He was quite sure that Burke
would make the same agreement, and we telegraphed him to come
immediately. I am going to be very careful about Burke, however, and
sound him well before I tell him anything.

"'Yesterday we found our vessel. She arrived in port a few days ago, and
is now unloading. She is a small brig, and I think she will do; in fact,
she has got to do. By the time Burke gets here I think we shall be ready
to sail. Up to that time we shall be as busy as men can be, and it will
be impossible for me to go to San Francisco. I must attend to the
shipping of the treasure I have stored in the City of Mexico. I shall
send some to one place and some to another, but want it all turned into
coin or bonds before I start. Besides, I must be on hand to see Burke the
moment he arrives. I am not yet quite sure about him, and if Shirley
should let anything slip while I was away our looked-for fortune might be
lost to us.'

"And that," said Edna, "is all of the letter that I need read, except
that he tells me he expects to write again before he starts, and that
his address after he sails will be Wraxton, Fuguet & Co., American
bankers in Paris."




CHAPTER XXVII

EDNA MAKES HER PLANS


When she had finished reading the many pages of the letter, Edna leaned
back on the sofa and closed her eyes. Ralph sat upright in his chair and
gazed intently before him.

"So we are not to see the captain again," he said presently. "But I
suppose that when a man has a thing to do, the best thing is to go
and do it."

"Yes," said his sister, "that is the best thing."

"And what are we to do?"

"I am now trying to decide," she answered.

"Doesn't he say anything about it?"

"Not a word," replied Edna. "I suppose he considered he had made his
letter long enough."

About an hour after this, when the two met again, Edna said: "I have been
writing to Captain Horn, and am going to write to Mrs. Cliff. I have
decided what we shall do. I am going to France."

"To France!" cried Ralph. "Both of us?"

"Yes, both of us. I made up my mind about this since I saw you."

"What are you going to France for?" he exclaimed. "Come, let us have it
all--quick."

"I am going to France," said his sister, "because Captain Horn is going
there, and when he arrives, I wish to be there to meet him. There is no
reason for our staying here--"

"Indeed, there is not," interpolated Ralph, earnestly.

"If we must go anywhere to wait," continued his sister, "I should
prefer Paris."

"Edna," cried Ralph, "you are a woman of solid sense, and if the
captain wants his gold divided up, he should get you to do it. And now,
when are we going, and is Mrs. Cliff to go? What are you going to do
with the two darkies?"

"We shall start East as soon as the captain sails," replied his sister,
"and I do not know what Mrs. Cliff will do until I hear from her, and as
for Cheditafa and Mok, we shall take them with us."

"Hurrah!" cried Ralph. "Mok for my valet in Paris. That's the best thing
I have got out of the caves yet."

Captain Horn was a strong man, prompt in action, and no one could know
him long without being assured of these facts. But although Edna's
outward personality was not apt to indicate quickness of decision and
vigor of purpose, that quickness and vigor were hers quite as much as the
captain's when occasion demanded, and occasion demanded them now. The
captain had given no indication of what he would wish her to do during
the time which would be occupied by his voyage to Peru, his work there,
and his subsequent long cruise around South America to Europe. She
expected that in his next letter he would say something about this, but
she wished first to say something herself.

She did not know this bold sailor as well as she loved him, and she was
not at all sure that the plans he might make for her during his absence
would suit her disposition or her purposes. Consequently, she resolved to
submit her plans to him before he should write again. Above everything
else, she wished to be in that part of the world at which Captain Horn
might be expected to arrive when his present adventure should be
accomplished. She did not wish to be sent for to go to France. She did
not wish to be told that he was coming to America. Wherever he might
land, there she would be.

The point that he might be unsuccessful, and might never leave South
America, did not enter into her consideration. She was acting on the
basis that he was a man who was likely to succeed in his endeavors. If
she should come to know that he had not succeeded, then her actions would
be based upon the new circumstances.

Furthermore, she had now begun to make plans for her future life. She had
been waiting for Captain Horn to come to her, and to find out what he
intended to do. Now she knew he was not coming to her for a long time,
and was aware of what he intended to do, and she made her own plans. Of
course, she dealt only with the near future. All beyond that was vague,
and she could not touch it even with her thoughts. When sending his
remittances, the captain had written that she and Mrs. Cliff must
consider the money he sent her as income to be expended, not as principal
to be put away or invested. He had made provisions for the future of all
of them, in case he should not succeed in his present project, and what
he had not set aside with that view he had devoted to his own
operations, and to the maintenance, for a year, of Edna, Ralph, and Mrs.
Cliff, in such liberal and generous fashion as might please them, and he
had apportioned the remittances in a way which he deemed suitable. As
Edna disbursed the funds, she knew that this proportion was three
quarters for herself and Ralph, and one quarter for Mrs. Cliff.

"He divides everything into four parts," she thought, "and gives me
his share."

Acting on her principle of getting every good thing out of life that
life could give her, and getting it while life was able to give it to
her, there was no doubt in regard to her desires. Apart from her wish to
go where the captain expected to go, she considered that every day now
spent in America was a day lost. If her further good fortune should
never arrive, and the money in hand should be gone, she wished, before
that time came, to engraft upon her existence a period of life in
Europe--life of such freedom and opportunity as never before she had had
a right to dream of.

Across this golden outlook there came a shadow. If he had wished to come
to her, she would have waited for him anywhere, or if he had wished her
to go to him, she would have gone anywhere. But it seemed as if that mass
of gold, which brought them together, must keep them apart, a long time
certainly, perhaps always. Nothing that had happened had had any element
of certainty about it, and the future was still less certain. If he had
come to her before undertaking the perilous voyage now before him, there
would have been a certainty in her life which would have satisfied her
forever. But he did not come. It was plainly his intention to have
nothing to do with the present until the future should be settled, so far
as he could settle it.

In a few days after she had written to Captain Horn, informing him of the
plans she had made to go to France, Edna received an answer which
somewhat disappointed her. If the captain's concurrence in her proposed
foreign sojourn had not been so unqualified and complete, if he had
proposed even some slight modification, if he had said anything which
would indicate that he felt he had authority to oppose her movements if
he did not approve of them,--in fact, even if he had opposed her
plan,--she would have been better pleased. But he wrote as if he were her
financial agent, and nothing more. The tone of his letter was kind, the
arrangements he said he had made in regard to the money deposited in San
Francisco showed a careful concern for her pleasure and convenience, but
nothing in his letter indicated that he believed himself possessed in any
way of the slightest control over her actions. There was nothing like a
sting in that kind and generous letter, but when she had read it, the
great longing of Edna's heart turned and stung her. But she would give no
sign of this wound. She was a brave woman, and could wait still longer.

The captain informed her that everything was going well with his
enterprise--that Burke had arrived, and had agreed to take part in the
expedition, and that he expected that his brig, the _Miranda_, would be
ready in less than a week. He mentioned again that he was extremely busy
with his operations, but he did not say that he was sorry he was unable
to come to take leave of her. He detailed in full the arrangements he had
made, and then placed in her hands the entire conduct of the financial
affairs of the party until she should hear from him again. When he
arrived in France, he would address her in care of his bankers, but in
regard to two points only did he now say anything which seemed like a
definite injunction or even request. He asked Edna to urge upon Mrs.
Cliff the necessity of saying nothing about the discovery of the gold,
for if it should become known anywhere from Greenland to Patagonia, he
might find a steamer lying off the Rackbirds' cove when his slow
sailing-vessel should arrive there. The other request was that Edna keep
the two negroes with her if this would not prove inconvenient. But if
this plan would at all trouble her, he asked that they be sent to him
immediately.

In answer to this letter, Edna merely telegraphed the captain, informing
him that she would remain in San Francisco until she had heard that he
had sailed when she would immediately start for the East, and for France,
with Ralph and the two negroes.

Three days after this she received a telegram from Captain Horn, stating
that he would sail in an hour, and the next day she and her little party
took a train for New York.




CHAPTER XXVIII

"HOME, SWEET HOME"


On the high-street of the little town of Plainton, Maine, stood the neat
white house of Mrs. Cliff, with its green shutters, its porchless front
door, its pretty bit of flower-garden at the front and side, and its neat
back yard, sacred once a week to that virtue which is next to godliness.

Mrs. Cliff's husband had been the leading merchant in Plainton, and
having saved some money, he had invested it in an enterprise of a friend
who had gone into business in Valparaiso. On Mr. Cliff's death his widow
had found herself with an income smaller than she had expected, and that
it was necessary to change in a degree her style of living. The
hospitalities of her table, once so well known throughout the circle of
her friends, must be curtailed, and the spare bedroom must be less
frequently occupied. The two cows and the horse were sold, and in every
way possible the household was placed on a more economical basis. She had
a good house, and an income on which, with care and prudence, she could
live, but this was all.

In this condition of her finances it was not strange that Mrs. Cliff had
thought a good deal about the investments in Valparaiso, from which she
had not heard for a long time. Her husband had been dead for three years,
and although she had written several times to Valparaiso, she had
received no answer whatever, and being a woman of energy, she had finally
made up her mind that the proper thing to do was to go down and see after
her affairs. It had not been easy for her to get together the money for
this long journey,--in fact, she had borrowed some of it,--and so, to
lessen her expenses, she had taken passage in the _Castor_ from San
Francisco.

She was a housewife of high degree, and would not have thought of
leaving--perhaps for months--her immaculate window-panes and her spotless
floors and furniture, had she not also left some one to take care of
them. A distant cousin, Miss Willy Croup, had lived with her since her
husband's death, and though this lady was willing to stay during Mrs.
Cliff's absence, Mrs. Cliff considered her too quiet and inoffensive to
be left in entire charge of her possessions, and Miss Betty Handshall, a
worthy maiden of fifty, a little older than Willy, and a much more
determined character, was asked to come and live in Mrs. Cliffs house
until her return.

Betty was the only person in Plainton who lived on an annuity, and she
was rather proud of her independent fortune, but as her annuity was very
small, and as this invitation meant a considerable reduction in her
expenses, she was very glad to accept it. Consequently, Mrs. Cliff had
gone away feeling that she had left her house in the hands of two women
almost as neat as herself and even more frugal.

When Mrs. Cliff left Edna and Ralph in San Francisco, and went home,
nearly all the people in the little town who were worth considering
gathered in and around her house to bid her welcome. They had heard of
her shipwreck, but the details had been scanty and unsatisfactory, and
the soul of the town throbbed with curiosity to know what had really
happened to her. For the first few hours of her return Mrs. Cliff was in
a state of heavenly ecstasy. Everything was so tidy, everything was so
clean, every face beamed with such genial amity, her native air was so
intoxicating, that she seemed to be in a sort of paradise. But when her
friends and neighbors began to ask questions, she felt herself gradually
descending into a region which, for all she knew, might resemble
purgatory.

Of course, there was a great deal that was wonderful and startling to
relate, and as Mrs. Cliff was a good story-teller, she thrilled the
nerves of her hearers with her descriptions of the tornado at sea and the
Rackbirds on land, and afterwards filled the eyes of many of the women
with tears of relief as she told of their escapes, their quiet life at
the caves, and their subsequent rescue by the _Mary Bartlett_. But it was
the cross-examinations which caused the soul of the narrator to sink. Of
course, she had been very careful to avoid all mention of the gold mound,
but this omission in her narrative proved to be a defect which she had
not anticipated. As she had told that she had lost everything except a
few effects she had carried with her from the _Castor_, it was natural
enough that people should want to know how she had been enabled to come
home in such good fashion.

They had expected her to return in a shabby, or even needy, condition,
and now they had stories of delightful weeks at a hotel in San Francisco,
and beheld their poor shipwrecked neighbor dressed more handsomely than
they had ever seen her, and with a new trunk standing in the lower hall
which must contain something.

Mrs. Cliff began by telling the truth, and from this course she did not
intend to depart. She said that the captain of the _Castor_ was a just
and generous man, and, as far as was in his power, he had reimbursed the
unfortunate passengers for their losses. But as every one knows the
richest steamship companies are seldom so generous to persons who may be
cast away during transportation as to offer them long sojourns at hotels,
with private parlors and private servants, and to send them home in
drawing-room cars, with cloaks trimmed with real sealskin, the questions
became more and more direct, and all Mrs. Cliff could do was to stand
with her back against the captain's generosity, as if it had been a rock,
and rely upon it for defence.

But when the neighbors had all gone home, and the trunk had to be opened,
so that it could be lightened before being carried up-stairs, the remarks
of Willy and Betty cut clean to the soul of the unfortunate possessor of
its contents. Of course, the captain had not actually given her this
thing, and that thing, and the other, or the next one, but he had allowed
her a sum of money, and she had expended it according to her own
discretion. How much that sum of money might have been, Willy and Betty
did not dare to ask,--for there were limits to Mrs. Cliff's
forbearance,--but when they went to bed, they consulted together.

If it had not been for the private parlor and the drawing-room car, they
would have limited Captain Horn's generosity to one hundred dollars. But,
under the circumstances, that sum would have been insufficient. It must
have been nearly, if not quite, two hundred. As for Mrs. Cliff, she went
to bed regretting that her reservations had not been more extended, and
that she had not given the gold mound in the cave more company. She hated
prevarications and concealments, but if she must conceal something, she
should have concealed more. When the time came when she would be free to
tell of her good fortune, even if it should be no more than she already
possessed, then she would explain everything, and proudly demand of her
friends and neighbors to put their fingers on a single untruth that she
had told them.

For the next day or two, Mrs. Cliff's joy in living again in her own home
banished all other feelings, and as she was careful to say nothing to
provoke more questions, and as those which were still asked became
uncertain of aim and scattering, her regrets at her want of reticence
began to fade. But, no matter what she did, where she went, or what she
looked at, Mrs. Cliff carried about with her a millstone. It did not hang
from her neck, but it was in her pocket. It was not very heavy, but it
was a burden to her. It was her money--which she wanted to spend, but
dared not.

On leaving San Francisco, Edna had wished to give her the full amount
which the captain had so far sent her, but Mrs. Cliff declined to receive
the whole. She did not see any strong reason to believe that the captain
would ever send any more, and as she had a home, and Ralph and Edna had
not, she would not take all the money that was due her, feeling that they
might come to need it more than she would. But even with this generous
self-denial she found herself in Plainton with a balance of some
thousands of dollars in her possession, and as much more in Edna's hands,
which the latter had insisted that she would hold subject to order. What
would the neighbors think of Captain Horn's abnormal bounteousness if
they knew this?

With what a yearning, aching heart Mrs. Cliff looked upon the little
picket-fence which ran across the front of her property! How beautiful
that fence would be with a new coat of paint, and how perfectly well she
could afford it! And there was the little shed that should be over the
back door, which would keep the sun from the kitchen in summer, and in
winter the snow. There was this in one room, and that in another. There
were new dishes which could exist only in her mind. How much domestic
gratification there was within her reach, but toward which she did not
dare to stretch out her hand!

There was poor old Mrs. Bradley, who must shortly leave the home in which
she had lived nearly all her life, because she could no longer afford to
pay the rent. There had been an attempt to raise enough money by
subscription to give the old lady her home for another year, but this had
not been very successful. Mrs. Cliff could easily have supplied the
deficit, and it would have given her real pleasure to do so,--for she had
almost an affection for the old lady,--but when she asked to be allowed
to subscribe, she did not dare to give more than one dollar, which was
the largest sum upon the list, and even then Betty had said that, under
the circumstances, she could not have been expected to give anything.

When she went out into the little barn at the rear of the house, and saw
the empty cow-stable, how she longed for fresh cream, and butter of her
own making! And when she gazed upon her little phaeton, which she had not
sold because no one wanted it, and reflected that her good, brown horse
could doubtless be bought back for a moderate sum, she almost wished that
she had come home as poor as people thought she ought to be.

Now and then she ordered something done or spent some money in a way that
excited the astonishment of Willy Croup--the sharper-witted Betty had
gone home, for, of course, Mrs. Cliff could not be expected to be able to
afford her company now. But in attempting to account for these
inconsiderable extravagances, Mrs. Cliff was often obliged to content
herself with admitting that while she had been abroad she might have
acquired some of those habits of prodigality peculiar to our Western
country. This might be a sufficient excuse for the new bottom step to the
side door, but how could she account for the pair of soft, warm
Californian blankets which were at the bottom of the trunk, and which she
had not yet taken out even to air?

Matters had gone on in this way for nearly a month,--every day Mrs. Cliff
had thought of some new expenditure which she could well afford, and
every night she wished that she dared to put her money in the town bank
and so be relieved from the necessity of thinking so much about
door-locks and window-fastenings,--when there came a letter from Edna,
informing her of the captain's safe arrival in Acapulco with the cargo of
guano and gold, and inclosing a draft which first made Mrs. Cliff turn
pale, and then compelled her to sit down on the floor and cry. The letter
related in brief the captain's adventures, and stated his intention of
returning for the gold.

"To think of it!" softly sobbed Mrs. Cliff, after she had carefully
closed her bedroom door. "With this and what I am to get, I believe I
could buy the bank, and yet I can only sit here and try to think of some
place to hide this dangerous piece of paper."

The draft was drawn by a San Francisco house upon a Boston bank, and Edna
had suggested that it might be well for Mrs. Cliff to open an account in
the latter city. But the poor lady knew that would never do. A
bank-account in Boston would soon become known to the people of Plainton,
and what was the use of having an account anywhere if she could not draw
from it? Edna had not failed to reiterate the necessity of keeping the
gold discovery an absolute secret, and every word she said upon this
point increased Mrs. Cliff's depression.

"If it were only for a fixed time, a month or three months, or even six
months," the poor lady said to herself, "I might stand it. It would be
hard to do without all the things I want, and be afraid even to pay the
money I borrowed to go to South America, but if I knew when the day was
certainly coming when I could hold up my head and let everybody know just
what I am, and take my proper place in the community, then I might wait.
But nobody knows how long it will take the captain to get away with that
gold. He may have to make ever so many voyages. He may meet with wrecks,
and dear knows what. It may be years before they are ready to tell me I
am a free woman, and may do what I please with my own. I may die in
poverty, and leave Mr. Cliff's nephews to get all the good of the draft
and the money in my trunk up-stairs. I suppose they would think it came
from Valparaiso, and that I had been hoarding it. It's all very well for
Edna. She is going to Europe, where Ralph will be educated, I suppose,
and where she can live as she pleases, and nobody will ask her any
questions, and she need not answer them, if they should. But I must stay
here, in debt, and in actual want of the comforts of life, making believe
to pinch and to save, until a sea-captain thousands and thousands of
miles away shall feel that he is ready to let me put my hand in my pocket
and spend my riches."




CHAPTER XXIX

A COMMITTEE OF LADIES


It was about a week after the receipt of Edna's letter that Willy Croup
came to Mrs. Cliff's bedroom, where that lady had been taking a
surreptitious glance at her Californian blankets, to tell her that there
were three ladies down in the parlor who wished to see her.

"It's the minister's wife, and Mrs. Hembold, and old Miss Shott," said
Willy. "They are all dressed up, and I suppose they have come for
something particular, so you'd better fix up a little afore you go down."

In her present state of mind, Mrs. Cliff was ready to believe that
anybody who came to see her would certainly want to know something which
she could not tell them, and she went down fearfully. But these ladies
did not come to ask questions. They came to make statements. Mrs. Perley,
the minister's wife, opened the interview by stating that, while she was
sorry to see Mrs. Cliff looking so pale and worried, she was very glad,
at the same time, to be able to say something which might, in some
degree, relieve her anxiety and comfort her mind, by showing her that she
was surrounded by friends who could give her their heartfelt sympathy in
her troubles, and perhaps do a little more.

"We all know," said Mrs. Perley, "that you have had misfortunes, and
that they have been of a peculiar kind, and none of them owing to your
own fault."

"We can't agree exactly to that," interpolated Miss Shott, "but I won't
interrupt."

"We all know," continued Mrs. Perley, "that it was a great loss and
disappointment to you not to be able to get down to Valparaiso and settle
your affairs there, for we are aware that you need whatever money is due
you from that quarter. And we understand, too, what a great blow it was
to you to be shipwrecked, and lose all your baggage except a hand-bag."

Miss Shott was about to say something here, but Mrs. Hembold touched her
on the arm, and she waited.

"It grieves us very much," continued the minister's wife, "to think that
our dear friend and neighbor should come home from her wanderings and
perils and privations, and find herself in what must be, although we do
not wish to pry into your private affairs, something of an embarrassed
condition. We have all stayed at home with our friends and our families,
and we have had no special prosperity, but neither have we met with
losses, and it grieves us to think that you, who were once as prosperous
as any of us, should now feel--I should say experience--in any manner the
pressure of privation."

"I don't understand," said Mrs. Cliff, sitting up very straight in her
chair. "Privation? What does that mean?"

"It may not be exactly that," said Mrs. Perley, quickly, "and we all know
very well, Mrs. Cliff, that you are naturally sensitive on a point like
this. But you have come back shipwrecked and disappointed in your
business, and we want to show you that, while we would not hurt your
feelings for anything in the world, we would like to help you a little,
if we can, just as we would hope you would help us if we were in any
embarrassment."

"I must say, however--" remarked Miss Shott; but she was again silenced
by Mrs. Hembold, and the minister's wife went on.

"To come straight to the point," said she, "for a good while we have been
wanting to do something, and we did not know what to do. But a few days
ago we became aware, through Miss Willy Croup, that what was most needed
in this house is blankets. She said, in fact, that the blankets you had
were the same you bought when you were first married, that some of them
had been worn out and given to your poorer neighbors, and that now you
were very short of blankets, and, with cold weather coming on, she did
not consider that the clothing on your own bed was sufficient. She even
went so far as to say that the blankets she used were very thin, and that
she did not think they were warm enough for winter. So, some of us have
agreed together that we would testify our friendship and our sympathy by
presenting you with a pair of good, warm blankets for your own bed; then
those you have could go to Willy Croup, and you both would be comfortable
all winter. Of course, what we have done has not been upon an expensive
scale. We have had many calls upon us,--poor old Mrs. Bradley, for
one,--and we could not afford to spend much money. But we have bought you
a good pair of blankets, which are warm and serviceable, and we hope you
will not be offended, and we do not believe that you will be, for you
know our motives, and all that we ask is that when you are warm and
comfortable under our little gift, you will sometimes think of us. The
blankets are out in the hall, and I have no doubt that Miss Willy Croup
will bring them in."

Mrs. Cliff's eyes filled with tears. She wanted to speak, but how could
she speak! But she was saved from further embarrassment, for when Willy,
who had been standing in the doorway, had gone to get the blankets, Miss
Shott could be restrained no longer.

"I am bound to say," she began, "that, while I put my money in with the
rest to get those blankets,--and am very glad to be able to do it, Mrs.
Cliff,--I don't think that we ought to do anything which would look as if
we were giving our countenances to useless extravagances in persons, even
if they are our friends, who, with but small means, think they must live
like rich people, simply because they happen to be travelling among them.
It is not for me to allude to hotels in towns where there are good
boarding-houses, to vestibule cars and fur-trimmed cloaks; but I will say
that when I am called upon to help my friends who need it, I will do it
as quick as anybody, but I also feel called upon by my conscience to lift
up my voice against spending for useless things what little money a
person may have, when that person needs that money for--well, for things
I shall not mention. And now that I have said my say, I am just as glad
to help give you those blankets, Mrs. Cliff, as anybody else is."