His Unknown Wife

The land seemed to be a replica of seaward islands; a fast-running tidal stream passed due east between two gaunt promontories. According to Maseden’s reckoning the straits they were now entering should open into Smyth’s Channel, and he bent his wits to the task of getting Topsy to understand that he wanted to meet one of the big ships which follow that route.

He believed she understood, but there could be no doubting she was so deeply concerned as to the probable whereabouts of the inhabitants of the coast region that she gave little heed to the wishes of her rescuers.

Oblivious of the pain she must be enduring, she contrived to perch herself in the bows, and scanned each bay and inlet of the ever-narrowing passage, though this was no subsidiary channel, but a deep and swift tide-way. The wind was strong and favorable and the boat was traveling fully eight knots an hour, a speed which no native craft could hope to rival. Still, Topsy’s marked uneasiness led Maseden to examine the rifle and make sure that its mechanism was in good order and the magazine charged.

He had no definite notion as to the type of weapons used by the Indians. Nearly all savages are armed with spears and clubs, but he believed that a people so low in the social scale as these South American nomads would not possess firearms. At any rate, he bade all hands keep a sharp look-out, and specifically ordered Sturgess and the girls to take cover in the event of an attack, unless an actual attempt was made to board the boat, in which case the girls could thrust with the rapiers and Sturgess might do good work with an ax.

They ran on several miles without incident, and were beginning to think that their guide was, perhaps, swayed more by recollection of earlier sufferings than by any active peril of the hour, when Topsy, whose piercing black eyes were ever and anon turned to the bluffs on either hand, uttered a sharp cry and pointed to a low cliff overhanging a bay they had just passed on the left.

Three thin columns of smoke were ascending from its summit.

Maseden could make nothing of her excited speech, but he understood her gestures readily, and took it that the smoke was a signal, while the danger, whatever it may be, lay ahead.

And, indeed, they had not long to wait for an explanation. From around a point not a mile distant, and directly in front, appeared a number of coracles, eight all told, and each containing two men, or a man and a woman. It was clear that this flotilla meant to waylay them, and the terror exhibited by the Indian girl was only too eloquent as to the fate of the boat’s occupants if they allowed themselves to be overpowered.

Maseden disposed his forces promptly. Sturgess was given the tiller. Topsy was put back on her couch in the bottom of the boat, and Nina and Madge were told to crouch by her side until their help was called for. From the outset the Americans did not dream of attempting to parley. Topsy’s unfeigned dread was sufficient to ban any such quixotic notion.

The coracles were strung out in an irregular line, covering a width of about four hundred yards, and, in laying his plans, Maseden recalled the strategy of a certain great admiral.

“Head slap for their center,” he told Sturgess confidently. “That was Nelson’s favorite way of attack. If possible, he always broke the enemy’s line in two, and I suppose it paid him. I think these heavy-caliber bullets will rip a native craft as though it were made of brown paper, and I should be able to sink at least four before the others can close in.”

Sturgess nodded.

“What Nelson says goes,” he grinned.

The battle opened at a range of one hundred yards, and Maseden’s first shot buckled the framework of the nearest coracle, so that it sank like a stone. There was a spurt of steam as the fire which every Indian boat carries reached the water, and two men swam away like otters.

The second shot struck a little too high. It whizzed through the craft’s hide cover and lodged in an Indian’s body, because the man yelled frantically. Maseden fired again, and damaged another coracle.

But by this time he had made the unpleasing discovery that these light skiffs could be propelled very rapidly for a short distance. In each a man or woman was paddling with furious energy, while their companions were using slings. Small, heavy stones rattled against and into the boat.

Sturgess was struck twice on the breast and left shoulder, and was only saved from serious injury by the stout oilskin coat he was wearing. Even so, he went white with pain, but he neither uttered a word nor neglected his task, which was to keep the sail filled and the boat traveling.

Maseden had two objects in mind – to beat off their assailants and yet keep sufficient ammunition in stock lest other Indians were encountered later. He sank two more coracles, and had killed or wounded three men, when a flint pebble struck him on the head, finding the exact spot where he was injured during the wreck.

He sank to his knees, and tried to say something. He believed he heard a crash and some shouting. Then the sky and hills and swift-running waters whirled in a mad dance before his eyes, and he lost consciousness.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE SETTLEMENT

Just as before, when he awoke on board the Southern Cross in surroundings so bewildering that he gave up the effort to localize them, his puzzled eyes now surveyed white-painted panelled walls, a brass-bound port-light, and some tapestry curtains. At any other time he would have realized at once that he was in a ship’s cabin, but now an uncomprehending stare soon yielded to a torpor of pain.

He believed that a gentle hand adjusted a bandage on his head, and was aware of a grateful coldness where before there had been heat and a throbbing ache. Afterwards – he thought it was immediately, though the interval was a full half hour – he looked again at the walls and ceiling with something of real recognition in his glance.

“Glad to see you’re regaining your wits, Mr. Alexander,” said a man’s voice, a strange but very pleasant voice. “Lucky for you you’ve got the right sort of thick head, or, from what I hear, it would certainly have been cracked twice.”

Mr. Alexander! Who was he? And where was he? Where were —

“May he talk a little now, doctor?” and Maseden would have had to be very dead if he did not know that Nina Forbes was sitting by his side. He turned, and even remembered to repress a groan lest some one in authority might not grant her request.

Even so the doctor was dubious.

“He must not be allowed to get excited,” he said.

“Then may he listen to me a minute?”

“Yes, if you really keep to schedule.”

“Don’t move, Alec!” whispered Nina, and there seemed to be a note in her voice that Maseden had heard only once before, though he could not recall the occasion. “We’re on board a mail steamer bound for England, but she touches at Punta Arenas and Buenos Ayres, so you must be ‘Mr. Alexander,’ not ‘Mr. Maseden,’ until we reach home. Don’t ask why just now. I’ll tell you to-morrow, or next day, when you are stronger. You will trust me, won’t you?”

“Trust you, Nina! Yes, forever!”

He looked at her, as though to make sure that his senses were not deceiving him and that it was really Nina Forbes who sat there, a Nina with her hair nicely combed and coiled and wearing a particularly attractive pink jersey and white serge skirt.

He thought that her eyes – those frank blue eyes he had gazed into so often – were suffused with tears.

“Why are you crying?” he demanded, with just a hint of that domineering way of his.

“Not for grief,” she said quietly. “But you must drink this now, and go to sleep. When you awaken again, perhaps the doctor will let C. K. come and chat with you.”

“C. K.? Is he all right?”

“Yes.”

“And Madge?”

“Yes. Not another word. Drink – to please me.”

“I’ll do anything to please you.”

He swallowed some milk and soda-water; took a whole tumbler-full, in fact.

“That’s fine,” he said. “Now I’ll hold your hand and you’ll tell me – ”

“You’re going to close your eyes and lie still,” she said firmly. “If you don’t I’ll leave you. If you do, I’ll stay here.”

“I’m bribed,” he said, smiling. Soon he slept, but this was nature’s healing sleep, not the coma of insensibility. When next he entered a world of reality he found Sturgess sitting where Nina had been.

“Going strong now, Alec?” inquired his friend.

Maseden did not answer at once. He wanted to be quite sure that the wretched throbbing in his head had ceased. Yes; there was a great soreness, but it was of the scalp, not of the internal mechanism. He sat bolt upright.

“Hi!” shouted Sturgess, “you mustn’t do that! Gosh! The doctor man will raise Cain with me if he knows I let you move.”

“I’m all right, C. K.”

“You’re going to flatten out straight away, or I’ll shriek for help.”