"Quite so. I thought, I believed that between there and----"

"Say between there and Baton Rouge----"

"Well, yes----"

"He would come to the main point?"

"Yes."

"And he did not?"

"You can best answer. It was at Natchez that you and those ruffianly

boys ran off with Mr. Davidson's boat!"

"That's all, your Honor," I remarked. "Take the witness, Mr.

Davidson!"

"But what right you have to cross-question me, I don't know!"

commented Mrs. Daniver, addressing a passing sea-gull, and pulling

down the corners of her mouth most forbiddingly.

"My disused and forgotten art comes back to me once in a while, my

dear Mrs. Daniver," I answered exultantly. "Pray, do you notice how

beautiful all the world is this morning? The sky is so wonderful, the

sea so adorable, don't you see?"

"I see that we are a long way from home. Tell me, are these sharks

here?"

"Oodles," said I, "and very large. No use trying to swim away. And

yonder coast is inhabited only by hostile cannibals. Barataria itself,

over yonder, is to-day no more than a shrimp-fishing village, part

Chinese, part Greek and part Sicilian. The railway runs far to the

north, and the ship channel is far to the east. No one comes here. It

is days to Galveston, westward, and between lies a maze of

interlocking channels, lakes and bayous, where boats once hid and may

hide again. Once we unship our flag mast, and we shall lie so saucy

and close that behind a bank of rushes we never would be seen. And we

do not burn coal, and so make no smoke. Here is my chosen hiding

ground. In short, madam, you are in my power!"

"But really, how far----"

"Since you ask, I will answer. Yonder, to the westward, a bayou comes

into Côte Blanche. Follow that bayou, eighty miles from here, and you

come to the house of my friend, Edouard Manning, the kindest man in

Louisiana, which is to say much. I had planned to have the wedding

there."

"Your effrontery amazes me--I doubt your sanity!" said Aunt Lucinda,

horrified. "But what good will all this do you?"

She had a certain bravery all her own, after all. Almost, I was on the

point of telling her the truth; which was that I had during the long

night resolved once more to offer my hand to Helena, and if she now

refused me, to accept my fate. I would torture her no more. No, if now

she were still resolute, it was my purpose to sail up yonder bayou, to

land at the Manning plantation, and there to part forever from Helena

and all my friends. I knew corners of the world far enough that none

might find me.

But I did not tell Aunt Lucinda this. Instead, I made no answer; and

we both sat looking out over the rippling gulf, silent for some time.

I noted now a faint haze on the horizon inshore, like distant

cloud-banks, not yet distinct but advancing. Aunt Lucinda, it seemed,

was watching something else through the ship's glasses which she had

picked up near by.




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