Argosy All-Story Weekly, November 13, 1920 — page 105: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE MYSTERIOUS QUEST. ship and its passengers—aye, and by that hated cargo—and they felt that in doing so, in suffering what they had suffered, they were helping a thief. They felt that the girl was suffering in her turn for her fa- ther’s sins. And knowing that they felt thus, she de- spised them for it. There was no dodging the issue. I had my choice of factions, and I took it. Even if I had owned no love for Dorothy Langton, I could not have turned away from her after she had ministered to me. My declaration came when we cast- aways gathered for our noontime meal. The three seafarers filled their plates at the little fire and withdrew to one side; Langton and his daughter did the same. And now the fire was between the two parties. I had scant appetite; I poured out a cup of cof- fee, took a ship’s biscuit, and—I joined the two passengers. The girl said nothing, but gave me a look which made me thankful I had done what I did. Her father smiled faintly, dif- fidently; he was a long ways from being well yet. And then the meal went on in silence. ‘No words passed between me and the skipper on the subject, but beginning with that afternoon he treated me with a marked punctiliousness, and when he had anything to say to me his words came cold and for- mal. As for Larson and Ross, they simply withdrew from me from that time on. Such things seem childish under ordinary circum- stances, but they are common enough when people are thrown together in the wilder- ness. Our situation was an ugly one. The The water was low. There was next to no hope of our being picked up. It looked as if we must be taking to the boat and run- ning our chances of capsizing offshore. The nearest port was Ensanada, something like one hundred and fifty miles to the north- ward. It was a toss-up whether we would be able to make it, even with fair weather holding on. : Life passed in ia dreadful routine during those days. But thirst was always with us. Noontime we ate our second meal; with dusk came the third gathering by the camp- fire, a separate group on either side. Every B Yes] morning one of us took his turn at watch- ing on the hill where that beacon was now built. Eyery noon he was relieved by an- other who stayed there until the coming of dusk. And that was all there was to do. On the fourth noon I was going to the knoll as usual, wondering whether there would be any hope of the overladen yawl weathering those high seas off the capes when we set out the next day for Ensanada. I passed the mound in the sand dunes which marked the grave of Lewis. My mind turned, in spite of my efforts to keep ~ off of the subject, to that heap of boxes. And that brought up the question of Lang- ton. It is hard to hold yourself loyal to a man in whom you do not believe, in whose honor you cannot pin your faith, no matter how much you would like to do so. Yet I could not dislike him, either; there was something about him that appealed to my sympathies; and that in itself would have made me less uncompromising than, the skipper and his companions, even if I had not been pulled by my new love for the girl, I was trying to reenforce my belief in Langton’s honesty. I reviewed the whole affair from the beginning; but there was no use trying to bolster up a case for him. And I loved his daughter. As I thought of her my heart leaped within me and my head went back. I did not care.what her father was; if she were standing by him, well, then, I would continue to do so. And that was all there was to it. While I was thinking on these things I had traveled from the grave of the muti- neer to another grave. I halted beside the mound where Wilson, Larson, and Ross had buried our little cook. My mind re- verted to that afternoon in the fog and the things that had taken place then. Some one was coming up behind me. I turned at the sound of the footsteps and faced Dorothy Langton. Neither of us said anything for some moments, but the two of us stood there side by side, looking at the grave of the cook, whose fate we two had come so close to sharing, and I remembered how love had come to my knowledge when death passed so near to me on that other afternoon. c Gomiue 900 S €O