"Talks like a book!" snorted Coke, and some of the men grinned sheepishly.

Hozier was coolly reminding them of those vital things which frenzy had failed wholly to take into account. Confidence was reborn in them. They wanted to cheer this fearless young officer who seemed to forget nothing, but the island promontories were so close at hand that perforce they were dumb.

The simplicity of the project was its best recommendation. Sailors themselves, the mind of the cruiser's commander was laid bare to them. He would soon be convinced that the launch had passed him in the dark ere the search-light looked out over the sea. Long before the circuit of Fernando Noronha was completed he would be itching to rush at top speed along the straight line to Pernambuco. It was a bold thing, too, to land on the island and stock their vessel for a voyage, the end of which no man could foresee. The dare-devil notion fascinated them. In that instant, the Andromeda's crew returned to their allegiance, which was as well, since it was fated to be stiffly tested many times ere they were reported inside 1 degree West again.

Unfortunately, Coke was in a raging temper. Never before had his supremacy been challenged. Having lost control over his men, he owed its restoration to Hozier. Such a fact was gall and wormwood to a man of his character, and he was mean-souled enough to be vindictive. Promising himself the future joy of pounding to a jelly the features of every mother's son among the forecastle hands, he began to snarl his orders.

"Watts, you must leg it to the sky-line, an' pipe the cruiser. Olsen, you go, too, an' see that Mr. Watts doesn't find a brewery. Hozier, p'raps you'd like to rig the mistletoe. Miss Yorke 'll 'elp, I'm sure. It's up to you, mister, an' his nibs with the sword, to parly-voo to the other convicts about the grub. Is there a nigger's wood-pile handy? If not, we must collar the hut. I'll take care of the stowage."

He meant each jibe to hurt, and probably succeeded, but Watts was too despondent, and Hozier and De Sylva too self-controlled, to say aught that would add to their difficulties. Nevertheless, he was answered, from a quarter whence retort was least expected.

"You must modify your instructions, Captain Coke," said Iris with quiet scorn. "It would be a shameful act to destroy the house of those who befriended us. They gave freely of their stores, as you will see by the supplies lashed to the catamaran, and will assist us further if Senhor De Sylva appeals to them——"

"You can safely leave that to me," broke in Dom Corria.

But Iris was not to be placated thus easily.

"I know that," she said. "I only wished Captain Coke to understand that if he cannot make clear his meaning he should obey rather than command."

"The lady 'as 'ad the last word. Now let's get busy," sneered Coke.

Hozier, who had not quitted his side since the incipient outbreak was quelled, gripped his shoulder.

"There is a pile of wood near the cottage," he said in Coke's ear. "I saw it there. It must be paid for. Have you any money?"

"A loose quid or two—no more."

"A sovereign will be ample. Miss Yorke has already given the owners two pounds."

"Wot for?"

"For their kindness. You are all there when it comes to a scrap, skipper, but at most other times you ought to be muzzled. No, don't talk now. We will discuss the point on some more suitable occasion, when we can deal with it fully, and Miss Yorke is not present."

Philip spoke in a whisper, but the low pitch of his voice did not conceal its menace. He was longing to twine his fingers round Coke's thick neck, and some hint of his desire was communicated by the clutch of his hand. Coke shook himself free. He feared no man born, but it would be folly to attack Hozier then, and he was not a fool.

"Let go, you blank ijjit," he growled. "I've no grudge ag'in you. If we pull out of this mess you'll 'ave to square matters wi' David Verity an' that other ole ninny, Dickey Bulmer. She's promised to 'im, you know. Told me so 'erself, so there's no mistake. I got me rag out, I admit, an' 'oo wouldn't after bein' 'owled down by those swine forrard. My godfather! Watch me put it over 'em w'en I get the chanst. Stop 'er, Norrie! There's plenty of way on 'er to round that bend."

Hozier reflected that he had chosen an odd moment to quarrel with his captain, whose mordant humor in the matter of the mistletoe was only accentuated by his reference to Iris's reported engagement. The pungent smell of the mangrove swamp was wafted now to his nostrils. It brought a species of warning that the disagreeable conditions of life in Fernando Noronha were yet active. It was not pleasant to be thus suddenly reminded of pitfalls that might exist in England; meanwhile, here was the launch thrusting her nose into the mud and shingle of this malevolent island.

To his further annoyance, San Benavides, who depended on his compatriot for a summary of the latest scheme, asked Iris to accompany De Sylva and himself to the hut.

"They are stupid creatures, these peasants," he said. "When they see you they will not be frightened."

There was so much reason in the statement that Iris was a ready volunteer. Soon all hands were at work, and it was due to the girl's forethought that strips of linen were procured from Luisa Gomez, and healing herbs applied to the cuts and bruises of the injured men. Sylva was all for leaving the two soldiers on the island, but Coke's sailor-like acumen prevented the commission of that blunder.

"No, that will never do," he said, with irritating offhandness. "These jokers will be found at daylight, an' they'll be able to say exactly wot time we quit. The wimmin can make out they was scared stiff an' darsent stir. It 'ud be different with the sojers. An' we ain't goin' to have such a 'eart-breakin' start, even if the cruiser clears away soon after two o'clock."

"Where do you propose to make for?"

"Where d'ye think, mister? Nor'-east by nor', to be sure, until we sight some homeward-bound ship."

There was a pause. The pair could talk unheard, since they were standing on the bank, and the men were either loading firewood and fruit and cassava, or stripping trees and vines to hide the superstructure of the launch.

"You mean to abandon everything, then?" said De Sylva. He seemed to be watching the onward sweep of the search-light as the warship went to the north. But Coke was shrewd. He felt that there was something behind the words, and he suspected the ex-President's motives.

"I don't see any 'elp for it," he answered. "Gord's trewth, wot is there to abandon? I've lost me ship, an' me money, an' me papers, an' 'arf me men. Unless one was lookin' for trouble, this ain't no treasure island, mister."

"Yet it might be made one."

"As how?"

"Do you not realize how greatly the members of the present Government fear my return to Brazil? Here, I am their prisoner, practically friendless, almost alone. They dare not kill me by process of law, yet they are moving heaven and earth to prevent my escape, or shoot me down in the act. Why? Because they know that the people are longing to hail me as President again. Suppose you and your men took me to Pernambuco——"

"S'pose hell!" snapped Coke.

"Please listen. You can but refuse when you look at the facts fairly. If, as I say, I were put ashore at Pernambuco, or at any other of half a dozen ports I can name, I should be among my own followers. You, Captain Coke, and every officer and man of your ship, and her owners, and the relatives of those who have lost their lives, would not only be paid all just claims by the new Government, but adequately rewarded. In your own case, the recompense would be princely. But, assuming that we board a vessel bound for Europe, what certainty have you that you will ever receive a penny?"

"Oh, reely, that's comin' it a bit thick, mister," growled Coke.

"You believe I am exaggerating the difficulties of your position? Pray consider. Your vessel is broken up. She was fired on while at anchor on the wrong side of the island, on the very day selected for my escape. You and your men manage to dodge the bullets, and, under my leadership, assisted by Captain San Benavides, you overrun the place by night, kill several soldiers, seize a launch, despoil peasants of their crops and stores, and make off with a good deal of property belonging to the Brazilian Government, not to mention the presence in your midst of such a significant personage as myself. Speaking candidly, Senhor Captain, what chance have you of convincing any international court of your innocence? Who will believe that you were not a true filibuster? That is what Brazil will say you are. How will you disprove it? In any event, who will enforce your claims against my country? English public opinion would never compel your Government to take action in such an exceedingly doubtful case, now would it?"

"If we was to try and land you in Brazil, we'd bust up our claim for good an' all," muttered Coke. Though this was a powerful argument against De Sylva's theory, it revealed certain qualms of perplexity. The other man's brilliant eyes gleamed for an instant, but he guarded his voice. He was in his element now. When words were weapons he could vanquish a thousand such adversaries.

"I think otherwise," he said slowly. "A judge might well hold that in a small vessel like the launch you were entitled to make for the nearest land. But I grant you that point; it is really immaterial. If I fail, you lose everything. Accept my offer, and you have a reasonable chance of winning a fortune."

"Wot exactly is your offer?"

"Ample compensation officially. Five thousand pounds to you in person."

"Five thousand!" Coke cleared a throat husky with doubt. He scratched his head under the absurd-looking kepi which he was still wearing; for a moment, his lips set in grim calculation. "That 'ud make things pretty easy for the missus an' the girls," he muttered. "An' there's no new ship for me w'en Dickey Bulmer cocks 'is eye at Hozier. It's a moral there'll be a holy row between 'im an' David. . . . D'ye mean it, mister?"

"Even if I fail, and my life is spared, I will pay you the money out of my own private funds," was the vehement reply.

"Well, well, leave the job to me. You sawr 'ow them tinkers jibbed just now. I must 'umor 'em a bit, d—n 'em. But wait till the next time some of 'em ships under me. Lord luv' a duck, won't I skin 'em? Not 'arf!"

De Sylva, with all his admirable command of English, could not follow the Coke variety in its careless freedom. But he knew his man. Though bewildered by strange names and stranger words, he was alive to the significance of things being made easy "for the missus and the girls." So, even this gnarled sea-dog had a soft spot in his heart! On the very brink of the precipice his mind turned to his women-kind, just as De Sylva himself had whispered a last memory of his daughter to San Benavides when their common doom was seemingly unavoidable.

He would urge no more, since Coke was willing to fall in with his designs, but he could not forbear from clinching matters.

"I promise on my honor——" he began.

But the nearer surface of the sea flashed into a dazzling distinctness, and Coke dragged him down to the launch. The cruiser had rounded Rat Island, and was devoting one sweeping glance eastward ere she sought her prey in creek or tortuous channel. The men were summoned hastily. Watts and Olsen had been warned to crouch behind the rocks on the crest, while those who remained near the launch were told to hide among the trees or crowd into the small cabin. Movement of any kind was forbidden. There was no knowing who might be astir on the hills, and a sharp eye might note the presence of foreigners in Cotton-Tree Bay. Hozier had not forgotten the risk of detection from the shore, and the vessel was plentifully decorated with greenery. The long, large-leafed vines and vigorous castor-oil plants were peculiarly useful at this crisis. Trailing over the low freeboard into the water, they screened the launch so completely that Watts and the Norwegian, perched high above the creek at a distance of three hundred yards, could only guess her whereabouts when the search-light made the Gomez plantation light as day.

The cruiser evidently discovered traces of the Andromeda on Grand-pere. She stopped an appreciable time, and created a flutter in many anxious hearts by a loud hoot of her siren. It did not occur to anyone at the moment that she was signaling to the troops bivouacked on South Point. De Sylva was the first to read this riddle aright. He whispered his belief, and it soon won credence, since the warship continued her scrutiny of the coast-line.

At last, after a wearying delay, she vanished. Five minutes later, Watts and Olsen brought the welcome news that she was returning to the roadstead.

It was then half-past two o'clock, and the sun would rise soon after five. Now or never the launch must make her effort. Ready hands tore away her disguise, she was tilted by crowding in the poop nearly every man on board, the engines throbbed, and she was afloat.

At daybreak the thousand-foot peak of Fernando Noronha was a dark blur on the western horizon. No sail or smudge of smoke broke the remainder of the far-flung circle. The fugitives could breathe freely once more. They were not pursued.

Iris fell asleep when assured that the dreaded warship was not in sight. Hozier, too, utterly exhausted by all that he had gone through, slept as if he were dead. Coke, whose iron constitution defied fatigue, though it was with the utmost difficulty that he had walked across the narrow breadth of Fernando Noronha, took the first watch in person. He chatted with the men, surprised them by his candor on the question of compensation, and announced his resolve to make for the three-hundred-mile channel between Fernando Noronha and the mainland.

"You see, it's this way, me lads," he explained affably. "We're short o' vittles an' bunker, an' if we kep' cruisin' east in this latitood we'd soon be drawrin' lots to see 'oo'd cut up juiciest. So we must run for the tramp's track, which is two hundred miles to the west. We'll bear north, an' that rotten cruiser will look south for sartin, seein' as 'ow they know we 'ave the next President aboard."

Coke paused to take breath.

"Wot a pity we can't give 'im a leg up," he added confidentially. "It 'ud be worth a pension to every man jack of us. 'Ere 'e is, special freight, so to speak. W'y 'e'd sign anythink."

Once the train was laid, it was a simple matter to fire the mine. When Hozier awoke, to find the launch heading west, he was vastly astonished by Coke's programme. It was all cut and dried, and there was really nothing to cavil at. If they met a steamship, and she stopped in response to their signals, her captain would be asked to take care, not only of Miss Yorke, but of any other person who shirked further adventure. As for Coke, and Watts, and the majority of the men, they were pledged to De Sylva. Even Norrie, the engineer, a hard-headed Scot, meant to stick to the launch until the President that was and would be again was safely landed among his expectant people.

Watts let the cat out of the bag later.

"Those of us 'oo don't leave Dom Wot's-'is-name in the lurch are to get ten years' full pay, extry an' over an' above wot the court allows," he said. "Just think of it! Don't it make your mouth water? Reminds me of a chap I wonst read about in a trac'. It tole 'ow 'e took to booze. One 'ot Sunday, bein' out for a walk, 'e swiped 'arf a pint of ginger beer, the next 'e tried shandy-gaff, the third 'e went the whole hog, an' then 'e never stopped for ten years. My godfather! Ten years' pay an' a ten years' drunk! It's enough to make a sinner of any man."

Hozier laughed. Two days ago he would have asked no better luck than the helping of Dom Corria to regain his Presidentship. Now, there was Iris to protect. He would not be content to leave her in charge of the first grimy collier they encountered, nor was he by any means sure that she would agree to be thus disposed of. He was puzzled by the singular unanimity of purpose displayed by his shipmates. But that was their affair. His was to insure Iris's safety; the future he must leave to Providence.

And, indeed, Providence contrived things very differently.

By nightfall the launch was a hundred miles west of the island. Norrie got eight knots out of her, but it needed no special calculation to discover that she would barely make the coast of Brazil if she consumed every ounce of coal and wood on board. The engines were strong and in good condition, but she had no bunker space for a long voyage. Were it not for Hozier's foresight she would have been drifting with the Gulf Stream four hours after leaving the island. As it was, unless they received a fresh supply of fuel from another ship, they must unquestionably take the straightest line to the mainland.

During the day they had sighted three vessels, but at such distances that signaling was useless, each being hull down on their limited horizon. Moreover, they had to be cautious. The cruiser, trusting to her speed, might try a long cast north and south of the launch's supposed path. She alone, among passing ships, would be scouring the sea with incessant vigilance, and it behooved them, now as ever, not to attract her attention. They were burning wood, so there was no smoke, and the mast was unstepped. Yet the hours of daylight were tortured by constant fear. Even Iris was glad when the darkness came and they were hidden.

At midnight a curious misfortune befell them. The compass had been smashed during the fight, and not a sailor among them owned one of the tiny compasses that are often worn as a charm on the watchchain. This drawback, of little consequence when sun or stars could be seen, assumed the most serious importance when a heavy fog spread over the face of the waters. The set of the current was a guide of a sort, but, as events proved, it misled them. Man is ever prone to over-estimate, and such a slight thing as the lap of water across the bows of a small craft was sure to be miscalculated; they contrived to steer west, it is true, but with a southerly inclination.

At four o'clock, by general reckoning, they were mid-way between island and continent. They were all wide awake, too weary and miserable to sleep. Suddenly a fog-horn smote the oppressive gloom. It drew near. A huge blotch crossed their bows. They could feel it rather than see it. They heard some order given in a foreign language, and De Sylva whispered:

"The Sao Geronimo!"

"The wot-ah?" demanded Coke, who was standing beside him.

"The cruiser!"

Coke listened. He could distinguish the half-speed beating of twin screws. He knew at once that the ex-President must have recognized the warship as she passed the creek, but, by some accident, had failed to mention her name during the long hours that had sped in the meantime. The sinister specter passed and the launch crept on. Everyone on board was breathless with suspense. Faces were shrouded by night and the fog, but some gasped and others mumbled prayers. One of the wounded soldiers shouted in delirium, and a coat was thrust over his head with brutal force. The fog-horn blared again, two cables' lengths distant. They were saved, for the moment!

In a little while, perhaps twenty minutes, they heard another siren. It sounded a different note, a quaintly harsh blend of discords. Whatsoever ship this might be, it was not the Sao Geronimo. And in that thrilling instant there was a coldness on one side of their faces that was not on the other. Moist skin is a weather-vane in its way. A breeze was springing up. Soon the fog would be rolled from off the sea and the sun would peer at them in mockery.

Coke's gruff voice reached every ear:

"This time we're nabbed for keeps unless you all do as I bid you," he said. "When the fog lifts, the cruiser will see us. There's only one thing for it. Somewhere, close in, is a steamer. She's a tramp, by the wheeze of 'er horn. We've got to board 'er an' sink the launch. If she's British, or American, O.K., as 'er people will stand by us. If she's a Dago, we've got to collar 'er, run every whelp into the forehold, an' answer the cruiser's signals ourselves. That's the sittiwation, accordin' to my reckonin'. Now, 'oo's for it?"

"Butt right in, skipper," said a gentleman who claimed Providence, Rhode Island, as the place of his nativity.

Hozier, who had contrived to draw near Iris while Coke was speaking, breathed softly, so that none other could hear:

"This is rank piracy. But what else can we do?"

"Is it wrong?" she asked.

"Well—no, provided we kill no one. We are justified in saving our own lives, and the average German or Italian shipmaster would hand us over to the Brazilians without scruple."

Iris was far from Bootle and its moralities.

"I don't care what happens so long as you are not hurt," she whispered.

"Mr. Hozier," said Coke thickly.

"Yes, sir."

"You've got good eyes an' quick ears. Lay out as far forrard as you can, an' pass the word for steerin'."

Hozier obeyed. The discordant bleat of a foghorn came again, apparently right ahead. In a few seconds he caught the flapping of a propeller, and silenced the launch's engines.

"We are close in now," he said to Coke, after a brief and noiseless drift. "Why not try a hail!"

"Ship ahoy!" shouted Coke, with all the force of brazen lungs.

The screw of the unseen ship stopped. The sigh of escaping steam reached them.

"Holla! Wer rufe?" was the gruff answer.

"Sink me if it ain't a German!" growled Coke, sotto-voce, "Norrie, you must stick here till I sing out to you. Then open your exhaust an' unscrew a sea-cock. . . . Wot ship is that?" he vociferated aloud.

Some answer was forthcoming—what, it mattered not. The launch bumped into the rusty ribs of a twelve-hundred ton tramp. A rope ladder was lowered. A round-faced Teuton mate—fat and placid—was vastly surprised to find a horde of nondescripts pouring up the ship's side in the wake of a short, thick, bovine-looking person who neither understood nor tried to understand a word he was saying.

These extraordinary visitors from the deep brought with them a girl and three wounded men. By this time the captain was aroused; he spoke some English.

"Vas iss diss?" he asked, surveying the newcomers with amazement, and their bizarre costumes with growing nervousness. "Vere haf you coomed vrom?"

Coke pushed him playfully into the cook's galley.

"This is too easy," he chortled. "Set about 'em, you swabs. Don't hurt anybody unless they ax for it. Round every son of a gun into the fo'c'sle till I come. Mr. Watts, the bridge for you. Olsen, take the wheel. Mr. Hozier, see wot you can find in their flag locker. Now, Mr. Norrie! Sharp for it. You're wanted in the engine-room."

And that is how ex-President Dom Corria Antonio De Sylva acquired the nucleus of his fleet, though, unhappily, an accident to a sea-cock forthwith deprived him of a most useful and seaworthy steam launch.



CHAPTER XI

A LIVELY MORNING IN EXCHANGE BUILDINGS

Coke and his merry men became pirates during the early morning of Thursday, September 2d; the curious reader can ascertain the year by looking up "Brazil" in any modern Encyclopedia, and turning to the sub-division "Recent History." On Monday, September 6th, David Verity entered his office in Exchange Buildings, Liverpool, hung his hat and overcoat on their allotted pegs, swore at the office boy because some spots of rain had come in through an open window, and ran a feverish glance through his letters to learn if any envelopes bearing the planetary devices of the chief cable companies had managed to hide themselves among the mass of correspondence.

The act was perfunctory. Well he knew that telephone or special messenger would speedily have advised him if news of the Andromeda had arrived since he left the office on Saturday afternoon. But it is said that drowning men clutch at straws, and the metaphor might be applied to Verity with peculiar aptness. He was sinking in a sea of troubles, sinking because the old buoyancy was gone, sinking because many hands were stretched forth to push him under, and never one to draw him forth.

There was no cablegram, of course. Dickey Bulmer, who had become a waking nightmare to the unhappy shipowner, had said there wouldn't be—said it twelve hours ago, after wringing from Verity the astounding admission that Iris was on board the Andromeda. It was not because the vessel was overdue that David confessed. Bulmer, despite his sixty-eight years, was an acute man of business. Moreover, he was blessed with a retentive memory, and he treasured every word of the bogus messages from Iris concocted by her uncle. They were lucid at first, but under the stress of time they wore thin, grew disconnected, showed signs of the strain imposed on their author's imagination. Bulmer, a typical Lancashire man, blended in his disposition a genial openhandedness with a shrewd caution. He could display a princely generosity in dealing with Verity as the near relative and guardian of his promised wife; to the man whom he suspected of creating the obstacles that kept her away from him he applied a pitiless logic.

The storm had burst unexpectedly. Bulmer came to dinner, ate and drank and smoked in quiet amity until David's laboring muse conveyed his niece's latest "kind love an' good wishes," and then——

"Tell you wot," said Dickey, "there's another five thousand due to-morrow on the surveyor's report."

"There is," said Verity, knowing that his guest and prospective partner alluded to the new steamer in course of construction on the Clyde.

"Well, it won't be paid."

David lifted his glass of port to hide his face. Was this the first rumbling of the tempest? Though expected hourly, he was not prepared for it. His hand trembled. He dared not put the wine to his lips.

"Wot's up now?" he asked.

"You're playin' some underhand game on me, David, an' I won't stand it," was the unhesitating reply. "You're lyin' about Iris. You've bin lyin' ever since she disappeared from Bootle. Show me 'er letters an' their envelopes, an' I'll find the money. But, of course, you can't. They don't exist. Now, own up as man to man, an' I'll see if this affair can be settled without the lawyers. You know wot it means once they take hold."

Then David set down the untasted wine and told the truth. Not all—that was not to be dreamed of. In the depths of his heart he feared Bulmer. The old man's repute for honesty was widespread. He would fling his dearest friend into prison for such a swindle as that arranged between Coke and the shipowner. But it was a positive relief to divulge everything that concerned Iris. From his pocket-book David produced her frayed letter, and Bulmer read it slowly, aloud, through eyeglasses held at a long focus.

Now, given certain definite circumstances, an honest man and a rogue will always view them differently. David had interpreted the girl's guarded phrases in the light of his villainous compact with Coke. Dickey, unaware of this disturbing element, was inwardly amazed to learn that Verity had lied so outrageously with the sole object of carrying through a commercial enterprise.

"'Tell him I shall marry him when the Andromeda returns to England from South America,'" he read. And again . . . "'The vessel is due back at the end of September, I believe, so Mr. Bulmer will not have long to wait.'"

If, in the first instance, David had not been swept off his feet by the magnitude of the catastrophe, if he had not commenced the series of prevarications before the letter reached him, he might have adopted the only sane course and taken Bulmer fully into his confidence. It was too late now. Explanation was useless. The only plea that occurred to him was more deadly than silence, since it was her knowledge of the contemplated crime that made Iris a stowaway. He had never guessed how that knowledge was attained and the added mystery intensified his torture.

Dickey rose from the table. His movements showed his age that night.

"I'll think it over, David," he said. "There's more in this than meets the eye. I'll just go home an' think it over. Mebbe I'll call at your place in the mornin'."

So here was Verity, awaiting Bulmer's visit as a criminal awaits a hangman. There was no shred of hope in his mind that his one-time crony would raise a finger to save him from bankruptcy. Some offenses are unforgivable, and high in the list ranks the folly of separating a wealthy old man from his promised bride.

Now that a reprieve was seemingly impossible, he faced his misfortunes with a dour courage. It had been a difficult and thankless task during the past month to stave off pressing creditors. With Iris in Bootle and Bulmer her devoted slave, Verity would have weathered the gale with jaunty self-confidence. But that element of strength was lacking; nay, more, he felt in his heart that it could never be replaced. He was no longer the acute, blustering, effusive Verity, who in one summer's afternoon had secured a rich partner and forced an impecunious sailor to throw away a worn-out ship. The insurance held good, of course, and there simply must be some sort of tidings of the Andromeda to hand before the end of September. Yet things had gone wrong, desperately wrong, and he was quaking with the belief that there was worse in store.

He began to read his letters. They were mostly in the same vein, duns, more or less active. His managing clerk entered.

"There's an offer of 5s. 6d. Cardiff to Bilbao and Bilbao to the Tyne for the Hellespont. It is better than nothing. Shall we take it, sir?"

The Hellespont was the firm's other ship. She, too, was old and running at a loss.

"Yes. Wot is it, coal or patent fuel?"

"Coal, with a return freight of ore."

"Wish it was dynamite, with fuses laid on."

The clerk grinned knowingly. Men grow callous when money tilts the scale against human lives.

"There's no news of the Andromeda, and her rate is all right," he said.

David scowled at him.

"D—n the rate!" he cried. "I want to 'ear of the ship. Wot the——"

But his subordinate vanished. David read a few more letters. Some were from the families of such of the Andromeda's crew as lived in South Shields, the Hartlepools, Whitby. They asked as a great favor that a telegram might be sent when——

"Oh, curse my luck!" groaned the man, quivering under the conviction that the Andromeda was lost "by the act of God" as the charter-party puts it. The belief unnerved him. Those words have an ominous ring in the ears of evil-doers. He could show a bold front to his fellowmen, but he squirmed under the dread conception of a supernatural vengeance. So, like every other malefactor, David railed against his "luck." Little did he guess the extraordinary turn that his "luck" was about to take.

The office boy announced a visitor, evidently not the terrible Bulmer, since he said:

"Gennelman to see yer, sir."

"Oo is it?" growled the shipowner.

"Gennelman from the noospaper, sir."

"Can't be bothered."

"'E sez hit's most himportant, sir."

"Wot is?"

"I dunno, sir."

"Well, show 'im in. I'll soon settle 'im."

A quiet-mannered young man appeared. He ignored David's sharp, "Now, wot can I do for you?" and drew up a chair, on which he seated himself, uninvited.

"May I ask if you have received any private news of the Andromeda?" he began.

"No."

"In that case, you must prepare yourself for a statement that may give you a shock," said the journalist.

David creaked round in his chair. His face, not so red as of yore, paled distinctly.

"Is she lost?" said he in a strangely subdued tone.

"I—I fear she is. But there is much more than an ordinary shipwreck at issue. Several telegrams of the gravest import have reached us this morning. Perhaps, before I ask you any questions, you ought to read them. They are in type already, and I have brought you proofs. Here is the first."

David took from the interviewer's outstretched hand a long strip of white paper. For an appreciable time his seething brain refused to comprehend the curiously black letters that grouped themselves into words on the limp sheet. And, indeed, he was not to be blamed if he was dull of understanding, for this is what he read:

"REVOLUTION IN BRAZIL.

"SERIOUS POSITION.

"STARTLING ESCAPADE OF A BRITISH SHIP.

"RIO DE JANEIRO, September 5th. A situation of exceptional gravity has evidently arisen on the island of Fernando do Noronha, whence, it is said, ex-President De Sylva recently attempted to escape. A battleship and two cruisers have been despatched thither under forced draught. No public telegrams have been received from the island during the past week, and the authorities absolutely refuse any information as to earlier events, though the local press hints at some extraordinary developments not unconnected with the appearance off the island of a British steamship known as the Andromeda.

"Later—De Sylva landed last night at the small port of Maceio in the province of Alagoas, a hundred miles south of Pernambuco. It is currently reported that Fernando Noronha was captured by a gang of British freebooters. De Sylva's return is unquestionable. To-day he issued a proclamation, and his partisans have seized some portion of the railway. Excitement here is at fever heat."

Verity glared at the journalist. He laughed, almost hysterically.

"The Andromeda!" he gasped. "Wot rot! Wot silly rot!"

"Better withhold your opinion until you have mastered the whole story," was the unemotional comment. "Here is a more detailed message. It is printed exactly as cabled. We have not added a syllable except the interpolation of such words as 'that' and 'the.' You will find it somewhat convincing, I imagine."

The shipowner grasped another printed slip. This time he was able to read more lucidly:

"PERNAMBUCO, September 4th. Public interest in the abortive attempt to reinstate Dom Corria De Sylva as President was waning rapidly when it was fanned into fresh activity by news that reached this port to-day. It appears that on the 31st ulto. a daring effort was made to free De Sylva, who, with certain other ministers expelled by the successful revolution of two years ago, is a prisoner on the island of Fernando do Noronha. Lloyd's agent on that island reports that the British steamer Andromeda, owned by David Verity & Co. of Liverpool, put into South Bay, on the southeast side of Fernando do Noronha, early on the morning of August 31st, and it is alleged that her mission was to take De Sylva and his companions on board. The garrison, forewarned by the central government, and already on the qui vive owing to the disappearance of their important prisoners from their usual quarters, opened fire on the Andromeda as soon as she revealed her purpose by lowering a boat.

"The steamer, being unarmed, made no attempt to defend herself, and was speedily disabled. She sank, within five minutes, off the Grand-pere rock, with all on board. With reckless bravado, her commander ran up the vessel's code signals and house flag while she was actually going down, thus establishing her identity beyond a shadow of doubt. A note of pathos is added to the tragedy by the undoubted presence of a lady on board—probably De Sylva's daughter, though it was believed here that the ex-President's family were in Paris. Telegrams from the island are strictly censored, and the foregoing statement is unofficial, but your correspondent does not question its general accuracy. Indeed, he has reason to credit a widespread rumor that the island is still in a very disturbed condition. No one knows definitely whether or not De Sylva has been recaptured. It is quite certain that he has not landed in Brazil, but the reticence of the authorities as to the state of affairs on Fernando Noronha leads to the assumption that he and a few stanch adherents are still in hiding in one of the many natural fastnesses with which the island abounds.

"The British community on the littoral is deeply stirred by the drastic treatment received by the Andromeda. It is pointed out that another ship, the Andros-y-Mela, believed to have been chartered by the insurgents, is under arrest at Bahia, and the similarity between the two names is regarded as singular, to say the least. Were it not that Lloyd's agent, whose veracity cannot be questioned, has stated explicitly that the Andromeda put in to South Bay—a point significantly far removed from the regular track of trading vessels—it might be urged that a terrible mistake had been made. In any event, the whole matter must be strictly inquired into, and one of His Majesty's ships stationed in the South Atlantic should visit the island at the earliest date possible. Delayed in transmission."

Something buzzed inside Verity's head and stilled all sense of actuality. He was unnaturally calm. Though the weather was chilly for early September, great beads of perspiration glistened on his forehead. His eyes were dull; they lacked their wonted shiftiness. He gazed at the reporter unblinkingly, as though thought itself refused to act.

"Is that the lot?" he inquired mechanically.

"Nearly all, at present. These cablegrams reached us through London, and the agency took the earliest measures to substantiate their accuracy. The Brazilian Embassy pooh-poohs the whole story, but Embassies invariably do that until the news is stale. By their own showing, Ambassadors are singularly ill-informed men, especially in matters affecting their own countries. Here, however, is a short telegram from Paris which is of minor interest."

And Verity read again:

"PARIS, September 6th. The members of Dom Corria De Sylva's family, seen early this morning at the Hotel Continental, deny that any lady connected with the cause of Brazilian freedom took part in the attempted rescue of the ex-President. They are much annoyed by the unfounded report, and hold strongly to the opinion that the revolution would now have been a fait accompli had not a traitor revealed the destination of the Andros-y-Mela and thus led to that vessel's detention at Bahia."

The lady! Iris Yorke! At last David's supercharged mind was beginning to assimilate ideas. He was conscious of a fierce pain in the region of his heart. The buzzing in his head continued, and the journalist's voice came to him as through a dense screen.

"You will observe that the former President's relatives tacitly admit that there was a plot on foot," the other was saying. "It is important to note, too, that the long message from Pernambuco, marked 'delayed in transmission' seems to imply a prior telegram which was suppressed. It alludes to a revolt of which nothing is known here. Now, Mr. Verity, I want to ask you——"

The door was flung open. In rushed Dickey Bulmer with a speed strangely disproportionate to his years. In his hands he held a crumpled newspaper.

"You infernal blackguard, have you seen this?" he roared, and his attitude threatened instant assault on the dazed man looking up at him. The reporter moved out of the way. Here, indeed, was "copy" of the right sort. Bulmer held a position of much local importance. That he should use such language to the owner of the Andromeda promised developments "of the utmost public interest."

David stood up. His chair fell over with a crash. He held on to the table to steady himself. Even Bulmer, white with rage, could not fail to see that he was stunned.

But Dickey was not minded to spare him on that account.

"Answer me, you scoundrel!" he shouted, thrusting the paper almost into David's face. "You are glib enough when it suits your purpose. Were you in this? Is this the reason you didn't tell me Iris was on board till I forced the truth out of you last night?"

The managing clerk came in. Behind him, a couple of juniors and the office boy supplied reenforcements. They all had the settled conviction that their employer was a rogue, but he paid them in no niggardly fashion, and they would not suffer anyone to attack him.

This incursion from the external world had a restorative effect on Verity. Being what is termed a self-made man, he had a fine sense of his own importance, and his subordinates' lack of respect forthwith overcame every other consideration.

"Get out!" he growled, waving a hand toward the door.

"But, sir—please, gentlemen——" stuttered the senior clerk.

"Get out, I tell you! D—n yer eyes, 'oo sent for any of you?"

Undoubtedly David was recovering. The discomfited clerks retired. Even Dickey Bulmer was quieted a little. But he still shook the newspaper under David's nose.

"Now!" he cried. "Let's have it. No more of your flamin' made-up tales. Wot took you to shove the Andromeda into a rat-trap of this sort?"

David staggered away from the table. He seemed to be laboring for breath.

"'Arf a mo'. No need to yowl at me like that," he protested.

He fumbled with the lock of a corner cupboard, opened it, and drew forth a decanter and some glasses. A tumbler crashed to the floor, and the slight accident was another factor in clearing his wits. He swore volubly.

"Same thing 'appened that Sunday afternoon," he said, apparently obvious of the other men's presence. "My poor lass upset one, she did. Wish she'd ha' flung it at my 'ed. . . . Did it say 'went down with all 'ands,' mister?" he demanded suddenly of the reporter.

"Yes, Mr. Verity."

"Is it true?"

"I trust not, but Lloyd's agent—well, I needn't tell you that Lloyd's is reliable. Was your niece on board? Is she the lady mentioned in the cablegram?"

Then Bulmer woke up to the fact that there was a stranger present.

"'Ello!" he cried angrily. "Wot are you doin' ere? 'Oo are you? Be off, instantly."

"I am not going until Mr. Verity hears what I have to ask him, and answers, or not, as he feels disposed," was the firm reply.

"Leave 'im alone, Dickey. It's all right. Wot does it matter now 'oo knows all there is to know? Just gimme a minnit."

Verity poured out some brandy. Man is but a creature of habit, and the hospitable Lancastrian does not drink alone when there is company.

"'Ave a tiddly?" he inquired blandly.

Both Bulmer and the journalist believed that David was losing his faculties. Never did shipowner behave more queerly when faced by a disaster of like magnitude, involving, as did the Andromeda's loss, not only political issues of prime importance, but also the death of a near relative. They refused the proffered refreshment, not without some show of indignation. Verity swallowed a large dose of neat spirit. He thought it would revive him, so, of course, the effect was instantaneous. The same quantity of prussic acid could not have killed him more rapidly than the brandy rallied his scattered forces, and, not being a physiologist, he gave the brandy all the credit.

"Ah!" he said, smacking his lips with some of the old-time relish, "that puts new life into one. An' now, let's get on with the knittin'. I was a bit rattled when this young party steers in an' whacks 'is cock-an'-bull yarn into me 'and. 'Oo ever 'eard of a respectable British ship mixin' 'erself up with a South American revolution? The story is all moonshine on the face of it."

"I think otherwise, Mr. Verity, and Mr. Bulmer, I take it, agrees with me," said the reporter.

"Wot," blazed David, into whose mind had darted a notion that dazzled him by its daring, "d'ye mean to insiniwate that I lent my ship to this 'ere Dom Wot's-'is-name? D'ye sit there an' tell me that Jimmie Coke, a skipper who's bin in my employ for sixteen year, would carry on that sort of fool's business behind 'is owner's back? Go into my clerk's office, young man, an' ax Andrews to show up a copy of the ship's manifest. See w'en an 'ow she was insured. Jot down the names of the freighters for this run, and skip round to their offices to verify. An' if that don't fill the bill, well, just interview yourself, an' say if you'd allow your niece, a bonnie lass like my Iris, to take a trip that might end in 'er bein' blown to bits. It's crool, that's wot it is, reel crool."

David was not simulating this contemptuous wrath. He actually felt it. His harsh voice cracked when he spoke of Iris, and the excited words gushed out in a torrent.

The reporter glanced at Bulmer, who was watching Verity with a tense expectancy that was not to be easily accounted for, since his manner and speech on entering the room had been so distinctly hostile.

"The lady referred to was Miss Iris Yorke, then?"

"'Oo else? I've on'y one niece. My trouble is that she went without my permission, in a way of speakin'. 'Ere, you'd better 'ave the fax. She was engaged to my friend, Mr. Bulmer, but, bein' a slip of a girl, an' fond o' romancin', she just put herself aboard the Andromeeda without sayin' 'with your leave' or 'by your leave.' She wrote me a letter, w'ich sort of explains the affair. D'you want to see it?"

"If I may."

"No," said Bulmer.

"Yes," blustered Verity, fully alive now to the immense possibilities underlying the appearance in print of Iris's references to her forthcoming marriage.

"An' I say 'no,' an' mean it," said the older man. "Go slow, David, go slow. I was not comin 'ere as your enemy when I found this paper bein' cried in the streets. It med me mad for a while. But I believe wot you've said, an' I'm not the man to want my business, or my future wife's I 'ope, to be chewed over by every Dick, Tom, an' 'Arry in Liverpool."

The reincarnation of David was a wonderful spectacle, the most impressive incident the journalist had ever witnessed, did he but know its genesis. The metamorphosis was physical as well as mental. Verity burgeoned before his very eyes.

"Of course, that makes a h— a tremenjous difference," said the shipowner. "You 'ave my word for it, an' that is enough for most men. Mr. Andrews 'll give you all the information you want. I'll cable now to Rio an' Pernambewco, an' see if I can get any straight news from the shippin' 'ouses there. I'll let you know if I 'ear anything, an' you might do the same by me."

The reporter gave this promise readily. He scented a possible scandal, and meant to keep in touch with Verity. Meanwhile, he was in need of the facts which the managing clerk could supply, so he took himself off.

Bulmer went to the window and looked out. A drizzle of sleet was falling from a gray sky. The atmosphere was heavy. It was a day singularly appropriate to the evil tidings that had shocked him into a fury against the man who had so willfully deceived him. David picked up the proof slips and reread them. He compared them with the paragraphs in the newspaper brought by Bulmer, and thrown by him on the table after his first outburst of helpless wrath. They were identical in wording, of course, but, somehow, their meaning was clearer in the printed page: and David, despite his uncouth diction, was a clever man.

He wrinkled his forehead now in analysis of each line. Soon he hit on something that puzzled him.

"Dickey," he said.

There was no answer. The old man peering through the window seemed to have bent and whitened even since he came into the room.

"Look 'ere, Dickey," went on David, "this dashed fairy-tale won't hold water. You know Coke. Is 'e the kind o' man to go bumpin' round like a stage 'ero, an' hoisting Union Jacks as the ship sinks? I ax you, is 'e? It's nonsense, stuff an' nonsense. An', if the Andromeeda was scrapped at Fernando Noronha, 'oo were the freebooters that collared the island, an' 'ow did this 'ere De Sylva get to Maceio? Are you listenin'?"

"Yes," said Bulmer, turning at last, and devouring Verity with his deep-set eyes.

"Well, wot d'ye think of it?"

"Did you send the ship to Fernando Noronha?"

It is needless to place on record the formula of David's denial. It was forcible, and served its purpose—that should suffice.

"Under ordinary conditions she would 'ave passed the island about the 31st?" continued Bulmer.

"Yes. Confound it, 'aven't I bin cablin' there every two days for a fortnight or more? B'lieve me or not, Dickey, it cut me to the 'eart to keep you in the dark about Iris. But I begun it, like an ijjit, an' kep' on with it."

"To sweeten me on account of the new ships, I s'pose?"

"Yes, that's it. No more lyin' for me. I'm sick of it."

"For the same reason you wanted that letter published?"

"Well—yes. There! You see I'm talkin' straight."

"So am I. If—if Iris is alive, the partnership goes on. If—she's dead, it doesn't."

"D'ye mean it?"

"I always mean wot I say."

The click of an indicator on the desk showed that Verity's private telephone had been switched on from the general office. By sheer force of routine, David picked up a receiver and placed it to his ear. The sub-editor of the newspaper whose representative had not been gone five minutes asked if he was speaking to Mr. Verity.

"Yes," said David, "wot's up now?" and he motioned to Bulmer to use a second receiver.

"A cablegram from Pernambuco states specifically that the captain and crew of the Andromeda fought their way across the island of Fernando Noronha, rescued Dom De Sylva, seized a steam launch, attacked and captured the German steamship Unser Fritz, and landed the insurgent leader at Maceio. The message goes on to say that the captain's name is Coke, and that he is accompanied by his daughter. . . . Eh? What did you say? . . . Are you there?"

"Yes, I'm 'ere, or I think I am," said David with a desperate calmness. "Is that all?"

"All for the present."

"It doesn't say that Coke is a ravin', tearin', 'owlin' lunatic, does it?"

"No. Is that your view?"

Bulmer's hand gripped David's wrist. Their eyes met.

"I was thinkin' that the chap who writes these penny novelette wires might 'ave rounded up his yarn in good shape," said Verity aloud.

"But there is not the slightest doubt that something of the kind has occurred," said the voice.

"It's a put-up job!" roared David. "Them bloomin' Portygees 'ave sunk my ship, an' they're whackin' in their flam now so as to score first blow. A year-old baby 'ud see that if 'is father was a lawyer."

The sub-editor laughed.

"Well, I'll ring you up again when the next message comes through," he said.

But to Bulmer, David said savagely:

"Wot's bitten Coke? 'E must 'ave gone stark, starin' mad."

"Iris is alive!" murmured Bulmer.

"Nice mess she med of things w'en she slung 'er 'ook from Linden 'Ouse," grunted her uncle.

"I don't blame 'er. She meant no 'arm. She's on'y a bit of a lass, w'en all is said an' done. Mebbe it's my fault, or yours, or the fault of both of us. An' now, David, I'll tell you wot I 'ad in me mind in comin' 'ere this morning. You're hard up. You don't know where to turn for a penny. If you're agreeable, I'll put a trustworthy man in this office an' give 'im full powers to pull your affairs straight. Mind you, I'm doin' this for Iris, not for you. An' now that we know wot's 'appening in South America, you an' I will go out there and look into things. A mail steamer will take us there in sixteen days, an' before we sail we can work the cables a bit so as to stop Iris from startin' for 'ome before we arrive. The trip will do us good, an' we'll be away from the gossip of Bootle. Are you game? Well, gimme your 'and on it."



CHAPTER XII

THE LURE OF GOLD

"Philip, I want to tell you something."

"Something pleasant?"

"No."

"Then why tell me?"

"Because, unhappily, it must be told. I hope you will forgive me, though I shall never forgive myself. Oh, my dear, my dear, why did we ever meet? And what am I to say? I—well, I have promised to marry another man."

"Disgraceful!" said Philip.

Though Iris's faltered confession might fairly be regarded as astounding, Philip was unmoved. The German captain had given him a cigar, and he was examining it with a suspicion that was pardonable after the first few whiffs.

"Philip dear, this is quite serious," said Iris, momentarily withdrawing her wistful gaze from the far-away line where sapphire sea and amber sky met in harmony. Northeastern Brazil is a favored clime. Bad weather is there a mere link, as it were, between unbroken weeks of brilliant sunshine, when nature lolls in the warmth and stirs herself only at night under the moon and the stars. That dingy trader, the Unser Fritz, ostensibly carrying wool and guano from the Argentine to Hamburg, was now swinging west at less than half speed over the long rollers which alone bore testimony to the recent gale. Already a deep tint of crimson haze over the western horizon was eloquent, in nature's speech, of land ahead. At her present pace, the Unser Fritz would enter the harbor at Pernambuco on the following morning.

Iris, her troubled face resting on her hands, her elbows propped on the rails of the poop on the port side, looked at Philip with an intense sadness that was seemingly lost on him. His doubts concerning the cigar had grown into a certainty. He cast it into the sea.

"I really mean what I say," she continued in a low voice that vibrated with emotion, for her obvious distress was enhanced by his evident belief that she was jesting. "I have given my word—written it—entered into a most solemn obligation. Somehow, the prospect of reaching a civilized place to-morrow induces a more ordered state of mind than has been possible since—since the Andromeda was lost."

"Who is he?" demanded Hozier darkly. "Coke is married. So is Watts. Dom Corria has other fish to fry than to dream of committing bigamy. Of course, I am well aware that you have been flirting outrageously with San Benavides——"

"Please don't make my duty harder for me," pleaded Iris. "Before I met you, before we spoke to each other that first day at Liverpool, I had promised to marry Mr. Bulmer, an old friend of my uncle's——"

"Oh,—he? . . . I am sorry for Mr. Bulmer, but it can't be done," interrupted Hozier.

"Philip, you do not understand. I—I cared for nobody then . . . and my uncle said he was in danger of bankruptcy . . . and Mr. Bulmer undertook to help him if I would consent. . . ."

"Yes," agreed Philip, with an air of pleasant detachment, "I see. You are in a first-rate fix. I was always prepared for that. Coke told me about Bulmer—warned me off, so to speak. I forgot his claims at odd times, just for a minute or so, but he is a real bugbear—a sort of matrimonial bogey-man. If all goes well, and we enter Pernambuco without being fired at, you will be handed over to the British Consul, and he will send a rousing telegram about you to England. Bulmer, of course, will cause a rare stir at home. Who wouldn't? No wonder you are scared! It seems to me that there is only one safe line of action left open."

Iris did not respond to his raillery. She was despondent, nervous, uncertain of her own strength, afraid of the hurricane of publicity that would shortly swoop down on her.

"I wish you would realize how I feel in this matter," she said, with a persistence that was at least creditable to her honesty of purpose. "A woman's word should be held as sacred as a man's, Philip."

He turned and met her eyes. There was a tender smile on his lips.

"So you really believe you will be compelled to marry Mr. Bulmer?" he cried.

"Oh, don't be horrid!" she almost sobbed. "I cuc—cuc—can't help it."

"I have given some thought to the problem myself," he said, for, in truth, he was beginning to be alarmed by her tenacity, though determined not to let her perceive his changed mood. "Curiously enough, I was thinking more of your dilemma than of the signals when we were overhauled by the Sao Geronimo this morning. Odd, isn't it, how things pop into one's mind at the most unexpected moments? While I was coding our explanation that we were putting into Pernambuco for repairs, and that no steam yacht had been sighted between here and the River Plate, I was really trying to imagine what the cruiser's people would have said if I had told them the actual truth."

His apparent gravity drew the girl's thoughts for an instant from contemplating her own unhappiness.

"How could you have done that?" she asked. "We are going there to suit Senhor De Sylva's ends. We have suffered so much already for his sake that we could hardly betray him now."

Hozier spread wide his hands with a fine affectation of amazement.

"I wasn't talking about De Sylva," he cried. "My remarks were strictly confined to the question of your marriage. I know you far too well, Iris, to permit you to go back to Bootle to be lectured and browbeaten by your uncle. I have never seen him, but, from all accounts, he is a rather remarkable person. He likes to have his own way, irrespective of other folks' feelings. I am a good guesser, Iris. I have a pretty fair notion why Coke meant to leave our poor ship's bones on a South American reef. I appreciate exactly how well it would serve Mr. David Verity's interests if his niece married a wealthy old party like Bulmer. By the way how old is Bulmer?"

"Nearly seventy."

Even Iris herself smiled then, though her tremulous mirth threatened to dissolve in tears.

"Ah, that's a pity," said Hozier.

"It is very unkind of you to treat me in this manner," she protested.

"But I am trying to help you. I say it is a pity that Bulmer should be a patriarch, because his only hope of marrying you is that I shall die first. Even then he must be prepared to espouse my widow. By the way, is it disrespectful to describe him as a patriarch? Isn't there some proverb about three score years and ten?"

"Philip, if only you would appreciate my dreadful position——"

"I do. It ought to be ended. The first parson we meet shall be commandeered. Don't you see, dear, we really must get married at Pernambuco? That is what I wanted to signal to the cruiser: 'The Unser Fritz is taking a happy couple to church.' Wouldn't that have been a surprise?"

Iris clenched her little hands in despair. Why did he not understand her misery? Though she was unwavering in her resolution to keep faith with the man who had twitted her with taking all and giving nothing in return, she could not wholly restrain the tumult in her veins. Married in Pernambuco! Ah, if only that were possible! Yet she did not flinch from the lover-like scrutiny with which Philip now favored her.

"I am sure we would be happy together," she said, with a pathetic confidence that tempted him strongly to take her in his arms and kiss away her fears. "But we must be brave, Philip dear, brave in the peaceful hours as in those which call for another sort of courage. Last night we lived in a different world. We looked at death, you and I together, not once but many times, and you, at least, kept him at bay. But that is past. To-day we are going back to the commonplace. We must forget what happened in the land of dreams. I will never love any man but you, Philip; yet—I cannot marry you."

"You will marry me—in Pernambuco."

"I will not because I may not. Oh, spare me any more of this! I cannot bear it. Have pity, dear!"

"Iris, let us at least look at the position calmly. Do you really think that fate's own decree should be set aside merely to keep David Verity out of the Bankruptcy Court?"

"I have given my promise, and those two men are certain I will keep it."

"Ah, they shall release you. What then?"

"You do not know my uncle, or Mr. Bulmer. Money is their god. They would tell you that money can control fate. We, you and I, might despise their creed, but how am I to shirk the claims of gratitude? I owe everything to my uncle. He rescued my mother and me from dire poverty. He gave us freely of his abundance. Would you have me fail him now that he seeks my aid? Ah, me! If only I had never come on this mad voyage! But it is too late to think of that now. Perhaps—if I had not promised—I might steel my heart against him—but, Philip, you would never think highly of me again if I were so ready to rend the hand that fed me. We have had our hour, dear. Its memory will never leave me. I shall think of you, dream of you, when, it may be, some other girl—oh, no, I do not mean that! Philip, don't be angry with me to-day. You are wringing my heart!"

It was in Hozier's mind to scoff in no measured terms at the absurd theory that he should renounce his oft-won bride because a pair of elderly gentlemen in Bootle had made a bargain in which she was staked against so many bags of gold. But pity for her suffering joined forces with a fine certainty that fortune would not play such a scurvy trick as to rob him of his divinity after leading him through an Inferno to the very gate of Paradise. For that is how he regarded the perils of Fernando Noronha. He was young, and the ethics of youth cling to romance. It seemed only right and just that he should have been proved worthy of Iris ere he gained the heaven of her love. There might be portals yet unseen, with guardian furies waiting to entrap him, and he would brave them all for her dear sake. But his very soul rebelled against the notion that he had become her chosen knight merely to gratify the unholy ardor of some decrepit millionaire. He laughed savagely at the fantasy, and his protest burst into words strange on his lips.

"I shall never give you up to any other man," he said. "I have won you by the sword, and, please God, I shall keep you against all claimants. Twenty-two men sailed out of Liverpool on board the Andromeda, and it was given to me among the twenty-two that I should pluck you from darkness into light. I had only seen you that day on the wharf, yet I was thinking of you constantly, little dreaming that you were within a few yards of me all the time. I was planning some means of meeting you again when our surly-tempered skipper bade me burst in the door that kept you from me. And that is what I have been doing ever since, Iris—breaking down barriers, smashing them, whether they were flesh and blood or nature's own obstacles, so that I might not lose you. Give you up! Not while I live! Why, you yourself dragged me away from certain death when I was lying unconscious on the Andromeda's deck. A second time, you saved not me alone but the ten others who are left out of the twenty-two, by bringing us back to Grand-pere in the hour that our escape seemed to be assured had we put out to sea. We are more than quits, dear heart, when we strike a balance of mutual service. We are bound by a tie of comradeship that is denied to most. And who shall sever it? The man who gains three times the worth of his ship by reason of the very dangers we have shared! To state such a mad proposition is to answer it. Who is he that he should sunder those whom God has joined together? And what other man and woman now breathing can lay better claim than we to have been joined by the Almighty?"

The strange exigencies of their lives during the past two days had ordained that this should be Philip's first avowal of his feelings. Under the stress of overpowering impulse he had clasped Iris to his heart when they were parting on the island. In obedience to a stronger law than any hitherto revealed to her innocent consciousness the girl had flown to his arms when he came to the hut. And that was all their love-making, two blissful moments of delirium wrenched from a time of a gaunt tragedy, and followed by a few hours of self-negation. Yet they sufficed—to the man—and the woman is never too ready to count the cost when her heart declares its passion.

But the morrow was not to be denied. Its bitter awakening had come. In the very agony of a sublime withdrawal Iris realized what manner of man this was whom she had determined to thrust aside so that she might keep her troth. She dared not look at him. She could not compel her quivering lips to frame a word of excuse or reiterated resolve. With a heart-breaking cry of sheer anguish she fled from him, running away along the deck with the uncertain steps of some sorely stricken creature of the wild.

He did not try to restrain her. Heedless of the perplexed scowl with which Coke was watching him from the bridge, he looked after her until she vanished in the cabin which had been vacated for her use by the chief engineer of the vessel. Even her manifest distress gave him a sense of riotous joy that was hardly distinguishable from the keenest spiritual suffering.

"Give you up!" he muttered again. "No, Iris, not if Satan brought every dead Verity to aid the living one in his demand."

Coke, to whom tact was anathema, chose that unhappy instant to summon him to take charge of the ship. The German master and crew had not caused trouble to their conquerors after the first short struggle. They washed their hands of responsibility, professed to be satisfied with the written indemnity and promise of reward given by De Sylva, and otherwise placed the resources of the vessel entirely at his disposal. A more peaceable set of men never existed. Though they numbered sixteen, three more than the usurpers, it was quite certain that the thought of further resistance never entered their minds. If anything, they hailed the adventure with decorous hilarity. It formed a welcome break in the monotony of their drab lives. Of course, they were utterly incredulous as to the ability of a scarecrow like Dom Corria to fulfil his financial pledges. Therein they erred. He was really a very rich man, having followed the illustrious example set by generations of South American Presidents in accumulating a fine collection of gilt-edged scrip during his tenure of office, which said scrip was safely lodged in London, Paris, and New York. But the world always refuses to associate rags with affluence, and these worthy Teutons regarded De Sylva and Coke as the leaders of a gang of dangerous lunatics who should be humored in every possible way until a port was reached.

It was precisely that question of a port which had engaged Coke in earnest consultation with De Sylva and San Benavides on the bridge while Iris and Hozier were lacerating each other's feelings on the poop.

Apparently, the point was settled when Hozier joined the triumvirate. Coke glanced at the compass, and placed the engine-room telegraph at "Full Speed Ahead," for the Unser Fritz had once been a British ship, and still retained her English appliances.

"Keep 'er edgin' south a bit," said he to Hozier. "There's no knowin' w'en that crimson cruiser will show up again, but we must try and steal a knot or two afore sundown."

The order roused Hozier from his stupor of wrathful bewilderment.

"Why south?" he asked. "If anything, Pernambuco lies north of our present course."

"We're givin' Pernambuco the go-by. It's Maceio for us, quick as we can get there."

Hozier was in no humor for conciliatory methods. He turned on his heel, and walked straight to where De Sylva was leaning against the rails.

"Captain Coke tells me that we are not making for Pernambuco," he said, meeting the older man's penetrating gaze with a glance as firm and self-contained.

"That is what we have arranged," said Dom Corria.

"It does not seem to have occurred to you that there is one person on board this ship whose interests are vastly more important than yours, senhor."

"Meaning Miss Yorke?" asked the other, who did not require to look twice at this stern-visaged man to grasp the futility of any words but the plainest.

"Yes."

"She will be safer at Maceio than at Pernambuco. Our only danger at either place will be encountered at the actual moment of landing. At Maceio there is practically no risk of finding a warship in the harbor. That is why we are going there."

"And not because you are more likely to find adherents there?"

"It is a much smaller town than Pernambuco, and my strength lies outside the large cities, I admit. But there can be no question as to our wisdom in preferring Maceio, even where the young lady's well-being is concerned."

"I think differently. At Maceio there are few, if any, Europeans. At Pernambuco the large English-speaking community will protect her, no matter what President is in power. I must ask you to reconsider your plan. Land Miss Yorke and me at Pernambuco, and then betake yourself and those who follow you where you will."

Coke jerked himself into the dispute.

"'Ere, wot's wrong now?" he demanded angrily. "Since w'en 'as a second officer begun to fix the ship's course?"

"I am not your second officer, nor are you my commander," said Philip. "At present we are fellow-pirates, or, at best, running the gravest risk of being regarded as pirates by any court of law. I don't care a cent personally what port we make, but I do care most emphatically for Miss Yorke's safety."

"We've argied the pros an' cons, an' it's to be Maceio," growled Coke.

Dom Corria's precise tones broke in on what threatened to develop into a serious dispute.

"You would have been asked to join in the discussion, if, apparently, you were not better engaged at the moment, Mr. Hozier," he said. "I assure you, on my honor, that there are many reasons in favor of Maceio even from the exclusive point of view of Miss Yorke's immediate future. She will be well cared for. I promise to make that my first consideration. The army is mainly for me, and Senhor San Benavides's regiment is stationed at Maceio. The navy, on the other hand, supports Dom Miguel Barraca, who supplanted me, and we shall surely meet a cruiser or gunboat at Pernambuco. You see, therefore, that common prudence——"

"I see that, whether willing or not, we are to be made the tools of your ambition," interrupted Hozier curtly. "It is also fairly evident that I am the only man of the Andromeda's company whom you have not bribed to obey you. Well, be warned now by me. If circumstances fail to justify your change of route, I shall make it my business to settle at least one revolution in Brazil by cracking your skull."

San Benavides, hearing the names of the two ports, understood exactly why the young Englishman was making such a strenuous protest. He moved nearer, laying an ostentatious hand on the sword that clanked everlastingly at his heels. He had never been taught, it seemed, that a man who can use his fists commands a readier weapon than a sword in its scabbard. Hozier eyed him. There was no love lost between them. For a fraction of a second San Benavides was in a position of real peril.

Then Dom Corria said coldly:

"No interference, I pray you, Senhor Adjudante. Kindly withdraw."

His tone was eminently official. San Benavides saluted and stepped back. The dark scar on De Sylva's forehead had grown a shade lighter, but there was no other visible sign of anger in his face, and his luminous eyes peered steadily into Hozier's.

"Let me understand!" he said. "You hold my life as forfeit if any mischance befalls Miss Yorke?"

"Yes."

"I accept that. Of course, you no longer challenge my direction of affairs?"

"I am no match for you in argument, senhor, but I do want you to believe that I shall keep my part of the compact."

Coke, familiar with De Sylva's resources as a debater, and by no means unwilling to see Hozier "taken down a peg," as he phrased it; eager, too, to witness the Brazilian officer's discomfiture if the second mate "handed it to him," thought it was time to assert himself.

"I'm goin' to 'ave a nap," he announced. "Either you or Watts must take 'old. W'ich is it to be?"

"No need to ask Mr. Hozier any such question," said the suave Dom Corria. "You can trust him implicitly. He is with us now—to the death. Captain San Benavides, a word with you."

"South a bit," repeated the skipper. "Call me at two bells in the second dog."

He was turning to leave the bridge with the Brazilians when a cheery voice came from a gangway beneath.

"Yah, yah, mine frent—that's the proper lubricant. I wouldn't give you tuppence a dozen for your bloomin' lager. Well, just a freshener. Thanks. Ik danky shun!"

"You spik Tcherman vare goot," was the reply.

"Talk a little of all sorts. Used to sing a Jarman song once. What was that you was a-hummin' in your cabin? Nice chune. I've a musical ear meself."

Someone sang a verse in a subdued baritone, tremulous with sentiment. The melody was haunting, the words almost pathetic under the conditions of life on board the disheveled Unser Fritz. They told of Vienna, the city beloved of its sons.

Es gibt nur eine Kaiser Stadt, Es gibt nur eine Wien.

"Shake, me boy!" cried the enraptured Watts to the ship's captain. "I do'n' know wot it's all about, but it's reel fine. Something to do with a gal, I expect. Well, 'ere's one of the same kidney:

I know a maiden fair to see, Take care! She can both false and friendly be, Beware, beware! Trust her not, She is fooling thee!"

Mr. Watts was both charmed and surprised when the friendly skipper joined in the concluding lines in his own language. But his pleasure was short-lived. Coke's inflamed visage glowered into the mess room.

"Sink me if you ain't a daisy!" he roared, pouncing on a three-quarters filled bottle of rum. "D'you fancy we're goin' to land you at Maceio cryin' drunk? No, sir, not this time. Over it goes, an' if you ain't dam careful, over you go after it!"

Watts could have wept without the artificial stimulus of the rum. To see good liquor slung into the sea in that fashion—well, it was a sin, that's wot it was! But Coke's furious eye quelled him; and revel and song ceased.

Above, on the bridge, Hozier smiled sourly at the squall which had so suddenly beset the fair argosy of the convivial-minded Watts. He tried to invest the incident with an excess of humor. Any excuse would serve to still certain disquieting doubts that were springing into alarming activity. Had he gone the best way to work in allaying Iris's conscience-stricken qualms? Was he justified in adopting such a bold line with De Sylva? Could it be possible—no, he refused to harbor any mean thought of Iris. She loved him, he was sure; his love for her was at once a torment and an excruciating bliss, and both of these wearing sensations sadly detracted from the efficiency of the officer of the watch. So our distracted Philip pulled himself up sharply, paced back and forth between port and starboard, and surveyed ship, binnacle, and horizon with alert vigilance.

On the fore-deck groups of sailors and firemen belonging to both vessels were fraternizing. There could be little room for speculation as to the subject of their broken talk. It was of De Sylva, of Brazil's new dictator, of the gold he would control when he became President again. The slow-moving Teutonic mind was beginning to assimilate the notion that there was money in this escapade. That the tatterdemalion then closeted with the Unser Fritz's captain could obtain a certified check for a million sterling, and twenty-five times as many millions of francs, and even then remain a man of means, was unbelievable; but if he regained power, that was different. Ende gut, alles gut. There might be pickings in it.

Soon after sunset Iris reappeared. She walked on the after deck with San Benavides, and seemed to be listening with great attention to something he was telling her. Hozier was often compelled to look that way in order to make certain that the Sao Geronimo was not overhauling the ship in one of her circling flights over the wide channel. He wondered what in the world San Benavides was saying that his chatter should be so interesting, and he acknowledged with a pang that Iris was deliberately avoiding his own occasional glances in her direction.

There is no saying what would have happened had he known that the Brazilian was relating the scene that took place on the bridge, suppressing its prime motive, and twisting it greatly to Hozier's detriment, though with an adroit touch that deprived Iris of any power to resent his words. Indeed, she read her own meaning into Philip's anxiety to reach Pernambuco, whereas San Benavides was striving to instill the belief that she would find excellent friends at Maceio. She was far too loyal-hearted to suspect Philip of a hidden purpose in urging that the voyage should end in one port rather than another. But she could not forget that he said repeatedly they would be married in Pernambuco. Indeed, the promise had a glamour of its own, even though it could never be fulfilled. More than once her cheeks glowed with a rush of color that San Benavides attributed to his own delightful personality, and, when she paled again, his voice sank to a deeply sympathetic note.

And here came Watts, rejuvenated, having imbibed many pints of the despised lager, and humming gaily:

Beware, Beware! Trust her not! She is foo-oo-ooling thee!

Confound the fellow. Why could he not chant the piratical doggerel that Coke abhorred? That, at least, would have been more appropriate to present surroundings? But would it? Ah, Philip felt a twinge then. "Touche!" chortled some unseen imp who plied a venomous rapier. Thank goodness, a sailor was standing by the ship's bell, with his hand on a bit of cord tied to the clapper. It would soon be seven o'clock. Even the companionship of the uncouth skipper was preferable to this brooding solitariness.

When Hozier was relieved, and summoned to a meal in the saloon with Norrie and some of the ship's own officers, Iris was nowhere visible. He went straight to her cabin, and knocked.

"Who is it?" she asked.

"I, Philip. Will you be on deck in a quarter of an hour?"

"No."

"But this time I want to tell you something."

"Philip, dear, I am weary. I must rest—and—I dare not meet you."

"Dare not?"

"I am afraid of myself. Please leave me."

He caught the sob in her voice, and it unmanned him; he stalked off, raging. He remembered how the fiend, in Gounod's incomparable opera, whispered in the lover's ear: "Thou fool, wait for night and the moon!" and he was wroth with himself for the memory. While off duty he kept strict watch and ward over the gangway in which Iris's cabin was situated. It was useless; she remained hidden.

The Unser Fritz was now heading southwest, and "reeling off her ten knots an hour like clockwork," as Norrie put it. The Recife, that enormous barrier reef which blockades hundreds of miles of the Brazilian coast, caused no anxiety to Coke. He was well acquainted with these waters, and he held on stoutly until the occulting light of Maceio showed low over the sea straight ahead. It was then after midnight, and the land was still ten miles distant, but the ship promptly resumed her role of lame duck, lest a prowling gunboat met and interrogated her.

As Coke had told Iris she might expect to be ashore about two o'clock, she waited until half-past one ere coming on deck. Despite her unalterable decision to abide by the hideous compact entered into with her uncle and Bulmer, her first thought now was to find Hozier. Though the sky was radiant with stars, a slight haze on the surface of the sea shrouded the ship's decks and passages in an uncanny darkness. Coke's orders forbade the display of any lights whatsoever, except those in the engine-room and the three essential lamps carried externally. So the Unser Fritz was gloomy, and the plash of the sea against her worn plates had an ominous sound, while the glittering white eye of the lighthouse winked evilly across the black plain in front.

In a word Iris was thoroughly wretched, and not a little disturbed by the near prospect of landing in a foreign country, which would probably be plunged into civil war by the mere advent of De Sylva. It need hardly be said that, under these circumstances, Hozier was the one man in whose company she would feel reasonably safe. But she could not see him anywhere. Coke and Watts, with the Brazilians and a couple of Germans, were on the bridge, but Hozier was not to be found.

At last she hailed one of the Andromeda's men whom she met in a gangway.

"Mr. Hozier, miss?" said he. "Oh, he's forrard, right up in the bows, keepin' a lookout. This is a ticklish place to enter without a pilot, an' we've passed two already."

This information added to her distress. She ought not to go to him. Full well she knew that her presence might distract him from an all-important task. So she sat forlornly on the fore-hatch, waiting there until he might leave his post, reviewing all the bizarre procession of events since she climbed an elm-tree in the garden of Linden House on a Sunday afternoon now so remote that it seemed to be the very beginning of life. The adventures to which that elm-tree conducted her were oddly reminiscent of the story of Jack and the Beanstalk. For once, the true had outrivaled the fabulous.

The steamer crept on lazily, and Iris fancied the hour must be nearer five o'clock than two when she heard Hozier's voice ring out clearly:

"Buoy on the port bow!"

There was a movement among the dim figures on the bridge. A minute later Hozier cried again:

"Buoy on the starboard bow!"

She understood then that they were in a marked channel. Already the road was narrowing. Soon they would be ashore. At last Hozier came. He saw her as he jumped down from the forecastle deck.

"Why are you here, Iris?" was all he said. She looked so bowed, so humbled, that he could not find it in his heart to reproach her for having avoided him earlier.

"I wanted to be near you," she whispered. "I—I am frightened, Philip. I am terrified by the unknown. Somehow, on the rock our dangers were measurable. Here, we shall soon be swallowed up among a whole lot of people."

They heard Coke's gruff order to the watch to clear the falls of the jolly-boat. The Unser Fritz was going dead slow. On the starboard side were the lights of a large town, but the opposite shore was somber and vague.

"Are we going to land at once, in a small boat?" said Iris timidly.

"I fancy there is a new move on foot. A gunboat is moored half a mile down stream. You missed her because your back was turned. She has steam up, and could slip her cables in a minute. They saw her from the bridge, of course, but I did not report her, as there was a chance that my hail might be heard, and we came in so confidently that we are looked on as a local trader. Come, let us buy a programme."

He took her by the arm with that masterful gentleness that is so comforting to a woman when danger is rife. Even his jesting allusion to their theatrical arrival in port was cheering. They reached the bridge. Some sailors were lowering a boat as quietly as possible.

Dom Corria approached with outstretched hand.

"Good-by, Miss Yorke," he said. "I am leaving you for a few hours, not longer. When next we meet I ought to have a sure grip of the Presidential ladder, and I shall climb quickly. Won't you wish me luck?"

"I wish you all good fortune, Dom Corria," said Iris. "May your plans succeed without bloodshed!"

"Ah, this is South America, remember. Our conflicts are usually short and fierce. Au revoir, Mr. Hozier. By daybreak we shall be better friends."

San Benavides also bade them farewell, with an easy grace not wholly devoid of melodramatic pathos. The dandy and the man of rags climbed down a rope ladder, the boat fell away from the ship's side, and the night took them.

"What did he mean by saying you would be 'better friends'?" whispered the girl. "Have you quarreled?"

"We had a small dispute as to the wisdom of landing you here," said Philip. "Perhaps I was wrong. He is a clever man, and he surely knows his own country."

"Mr. Hozier!" cried Coke.

"Yes, sir."

"Is all clear forrard to let go anchor?"

"Yes, sir."

"Give her thirty. You go and see to it, will you?"

Hozier made off at a run.

Iris recalled the last time she heard similar words. She shuddered. Would that placid foreshore blaze out into a roar of artillery, and the worn-out Unser Fritz, like the worn-out Andromeda, stagger and lurch into a watery grave.

But the only noise that jarred the peaceful night was the rattle of the cable and winch. The ship fell away a few feet, and was held. There was no moving light on the river. Not even a police boat or Customs launch had put off. Maceio was asleep; it was quite unprepared for the honor of a Presidential visit.



CHAPTER XIII

THE NEW ERA

A swaggering officer and a man habited like a beggar landed unobserved at a coal wharf, moored a ship's boat to a bolt, and passed swiftly through a silent town till they reached the closed gates of an infantry barrack perched on a hill that rose steeply above the clustering roofs of Maceio.

Though the seeming mendicant limped slightly, his superior stature enabled him to keep pace with the officer. The pair neither lagged nor hesitated. The officer knocked loudly on a small door inset in the big gates. After some delay it was opened. A sentry challenged.

"Capitao San Benavides," announced the officer, and the man stood to attention.

"Enter, my friend," said San Benavides to his ragged companion. The latter stepped within; the wicket was locked, and the click of the bolt was suggestive of the rattle of the dice with which Dom Corria De Sylva was throwing a main with fortune. Perhaps some thought of the kind occurred to him, but he was calm as if he were so poor that he had naught more to lose.

"Who is the officer of the guard?" San Benavides asked the soldier.

"Senhor Tenente [Lieutenant] Regis de Pereira, senhor capitao."

"Tell him, with my compliments, that I shall be glad to meet him at the colonel's quarters in fifteen minutes."

The queerly-assorted pair moved off across the barrack square. The sentry looked after them.

"My excellent captain seems to have been brawling," he grinned. "But what of the mendigo?"

What, indeed? A most pertinent question for Brazil, and one that would be loudly answered.

The colonel's house was in darkness, yet San Benavides rapped imperatively. An upper window was raised. A voice was heard, using profane language. A head appeared. Its owner cried, "Who is it?"—with additions.

"San Benavides."

"Christo! And the other?"

"One whom you expect."

The head popped in. Soon there was a light on the ground floor. The door opened. A very stout man, barefooted, who had struggled into a pair of abnormally tight riding-breeches, faced them.

"Can it be possible?" he exclaimed, striking an attitude.

Dom Corria spoke not a word. He knew the value of effect, and could bide his time. The three passed into a lighted apartment. De Sylva placed himself under a chandelier, and took off a frayed straw hat which he had borrowed from someone on board the Unser Fritz. The colonel, a grotesque figure in his present deshabille, bowed low before him.

"My President!—I salute you," he murmured.

"Thank you, General," said Dom Corria, smiling graciously. "I knew I could depend on you. How soon can you muster the regiment?"

"In half an hour, Excellency."

"See that there is plenty of ammunition for the machine guns. What of the artillery?"

"The three batteries stationed here are with us heart and soul."

"Colonel San Benavides, as chief of the staff, is acquainted with every detail. You, General, will assume command of the Army of Liberation. Some trunks were sent to you from Paris, I believe?"

"They are in the room prepared for your Excellency."

"Let me go there at once and change my clothing. I must appear before the troops as their President, not as a jail-bird. For the moment I leave everything to you and San Benavides. Let Senhor Pondillo be summoned. He will attend to the civil side of affairs. You have my unqualified approval of the military scheme drawn up by you and my other friends. There is one thing—a gunboat lies in the harbor. Is she the Andorinha?"

The newly-promoted general smote his huge stomach with both hands—"beating the drum," he called it—and the rat-tat signified instant readiness for action.

"The guns will soon scare that bird," he exclaimed. As Andorinha means "swallow" in English there was some point to the remark. Nor was he making a vain boast. The most astounding feature of every revolution in a South American republic is the alacrity with which the army will fire on the navy, et vice versa. The two services seem to be everlastingly at feud. If politicians fail to engineer a quarrel, the soldiers and sailors will indulge in one on their own account.

It was so now at Maceio. Dawn was about to peep up over the sea when twelve guns lumbered through the narrow streets, waking many startled citizens. A few daring souls, who guessed what had happened, rushed off on horseback or bicycle to remote telegraph offices. These adventurers were too late. Every railway station and post-office within twenty miles was already held by troops. Revolts are conducted scientifically in that region. Their stage management is perfect, and the cumbrous methods of effete civilizations might well take note of the speed, thoroughness, and efficiency with which a change of government is effected.

For instance, what could be more admirable than the scaring of the bird by General Russo? He drew up his three batteries on the wharf opposite the unsuspecting Andorinha, and endeavored to plant twelve shells in the locality of her engine-room without the least hesitation. There was no thought of demanding her surrender, or any quixotic nonsense of that sort. In the first place, no man would act as herald, since he would be shot or stabbed the instant his errand became known; in the second, as Hozier had explained to Iris, the gunboat could slip her cable very quickly, and Russo's artillerists might miss a moving object.

As it was, every gun scored, though the elevation was rather high. The shells made a sad mess of the superstructure, but left the engines intact. The sailors, on their part, knew exactly what had happened. Every man who escaped death or serious injury from the bursting missiles ran to his post. A wire hawser and mooring rope were severed with axes, the screw revolved, and the Andorinha was in motion. Though winged, she still could fly. The second salvo of projectiles was less damaging; again the gunners failed to reach the warship's vitals. Her commander got his own armament into action, and managed to demolish a warehouse and a grain elevator. Then he made off down the coast toward Rio de Janeiro.

The sudden uproar stirred Maceio from roof to basement. Its inhabitants poured into the Plaza. Every man vied with his neighbor in yelling: "The revolution is here! Viva Dom Corria! Abajo Sao Paulo!"

That last cry explained a good deal. The State of Sao Paulo had long maintained a "corner" in Brazilian Presidents. De Sylva, a native of Alagoas, was the first to break down the monopoly. Hence the cabal against him; hence, too, the readiness of Maceio, together with many of the smaller ports and the whole of the vast interior, to espouse his cause.

For the purposes of this story, which is mainly concerned with the lives and fortunes of a few insignificant people unknown to history, it is not necessary to follow in detail the trumpetings, proclamations, carousals, and arrests that followed Dom Corria's first success. It is a truism that in events of international importance the very names of the chief actors ofttimes go unrecorded. Future generations will ask, perhaps:—Who blew up the Maine? Who persuaded the Tsar to break his word anent Port Arthur? Who told Paul Kruger that the Continent of Europe would support the Boers against Great Britain? Such instances could be multiplied indefinitely, and the rule held good now in Brazil.

If any polite Pernambucano, Maceio-ite, or merchant of Bahia were informed that President De Sylva's raid was alone rendered possible by the help of a truculent British master-mariner and a dozen or so of his hard-bitten crew, he (the said Brasileiro) might be skeptical, or, at best, indifferent. But let the name of some puppet politician hailing from Sao Paulo be mentioned, and his eyes would flash with angry recognition; yet the Andromeda's small contingent achieved more than a whole army of conspirators.

The one incident, then, of a political nature, in which the victors of the tussle on Fernando Noronha were publicly concerned, was the outcome of a message cabled by Dom Corria while the smoke of Russo's cannon still clung about the quay.

It was written in German, addressed to a Hamburg shipping firm, and ran as follows: "Have sold Unser Fritz to Senhor Pondillo of this port as from September 1st, for 175,000 marks. If approved, cable confirmation, and draw on Paris branch Deutsche Bank at sight. Franz Schmidt, care German Consul, Maceio."

This harmless commercial item was read by many officials hostile to De Sylva, yet it evoked no comment. Its first real effect was observable in the counting-house of the Hamburg owners. There it was believed that Captain Schmidt had either become a lunatic himself or was in touch with a rich one. Schmidt was so well known to them that they acted on the latter hypothesis. They cabled him their hearty commendation, "drew" on the Paris bank by the next post, and awaited developments. To their profound amazement, the money was paid. As they had obtained 8,750 pounds for a vessel worth about one-quarter of the sum, they had good reason to be satisfied. It mattered not a jot to them that the sale was made "as from September 1st," or any other date. They signed the desired quittance, cabled Schmidt again to ask if Senhor Pondillo was in need of other ships of the Unser Fritz class, and the members of the firm indulged that evening in the best dinner that the tip-top restaurant of Hamburg could supply.

They were puzzled next day by certain statements in the newspapers, and were called on to explain to a number of journalists that the ship had left their ownership. She was at Maceio. Where was Maceio? Somewhere in South America.

"Es ist nicht von Bedeutung," said the senior partner to his associates. "Schmidt will write full particulars; when all is said and done, we have the money."

Yet it did matter very greatly, as shall be seen. Here, again, was an instance of an humble individual becoming a cog in the wheel of world politics. Within less than a month Schmidt was vituperated by half the chancelleries of Europe. A newspaper war raged over him. He became the object of an Emperor's Jovian wrath. "What's the matter with Schmidt? He's—all—right!" thundered the whole press of the United States. And all because he had made a good bargain at a critical moment!

But no one on board the Unser Fritz was vexed by aught save present tribulations when De Sylva and his aide quitted the ship. Be sure that not a soul thought of sleep. Every man, and the one woman whom chance had thrown in their midst, remained on deck and watched the slumbering town. It was only a small place. The Andorinha lay at one end of the harbor, the Unser Fritz at the other. They were barely half a mile apart, and Maceio climbed the sloping shore between the two points.

Hozier, of course, had forgiven Iris for her aloofness, and Iris, with that delightful inconsistency which ranks high among the many charms of her sex, found that "Philip dear," though she might not marry him, was her only possible companion. He, having acquired an experience previously lacking, took care to fall in with her mood. She, weary of a painful self-repression, cheated the frowning gods of "just this one night." So they looked at the twinkling lights, spoke in whispers lest they should miss any tokens of disturbance on shore, elbowed each other comfortably on the rails of the bridge, and uttered no word of love or future purpose.

They were discussing nothing more important than the sufferings of Watts—whom Coke would not allow to go out of his sight—when a lightning blaze leaped from the somber shadows of some buildings on the quay lower down the river. Again, and many times again, the sudden jets of flame started out across the black water. Iris, or Hozier, for that matter, had never seen a field-piece fired by night, but before the girl could do other than grip Philip's arm in a spasm of fear, the thunder of the artillery rolled across the harbor, and the worn plates of the Unser Fritz quivered under the mere concussion.

"By jove, they're at it!" cried Philip.

Iris felt the thrill that shook him. She could not see his face, but she knew that his blue eyes were shining like bright steel. She was horrified at the thought of red war being so near, yet she was proud of her lover. At these mortal crises, the woman demands courage in the man.

"Oh!" she gasped, and clung to him more tightly.

Under such circumstances it was only to be expected that his arm would clasp her round the waist; Disraeli's famous epigram was coined for diplomacy, not for love-making.

Hozier strained his eyes through the gloom to try and discover the effect of the cannonade on the gunboat. He was quickly alive to the significance of the answering broadside. Then the black hull grew dim and vanished. His sailor's sympathies went with the escaping ship.

"She has got away! I am jolly glad of it," he cried. "It was a dirty trick to open fire on her in that fashion. Just how they served the Andromeda, the hounds, only we had never a gun to tickle them up in return."

"Do you think that many of the poor creatures have been killed?" asked Iris tremulously. The din of ordnance and bursting shells had ceased as suddenly as it began. Lights appeared in nearly every house. Shouting men were running along the neighboring wharf. Maceio, never a heavy sleeper in bulk, dreamed for a second of earthquakes, leaped out of bed, and ran into the streets in the negligent costume which the Italians describe by the delightful word, confidenza.

"I don't suppose so," Hozier reassured her. "If the artillery had made good practice at that short range the gunboat must have sunk at her moorings. Her men naturally couldn't miss the town. There was a rare old rattle among the crockery behind the soldiers. Did you hear it? I wonder what went over?"