Part 35

“You're a different sort than when you went away, Ross,” said Jerry.

“Right you are,” answered Wilbur.

“But I will venture a prophecy,” continued Jerry, looking keenly at him.

“Ross, you are a born-and-bred city man. It's in the blood of you and the bones of you. I'll give you three years for this new notion of yours to wear itself out. You think just now you're going to spend the rest of your life as an amateur buccaneer. In three years, at the outside, you'll be using your 'loot,' as you call it, or the interest of it, to pay your taxes and your tailor, your pew rent and your club dues, and you'll be what the biographers call 'a respectable member of the community.'”

“Did you ever kill a man, Jerry?” asked Wilbur. “No? Well, you kill one some day--kill him in a fair give-and-take fight--and see how it makes you feel, and what influence it has on you, and then come back and talk to me.”

It was long after midnight. Wilbur rose.

“We'll ring for a boy,” said Ridgeway, “and get you a room. I can fix you out with clothes enough in the morning.”

Wilbur stared in some surprise, and then said:

“Why, I've got the schooner to look after. I can't leave those coolies alone all night.”

“You don't mean to say you're going on board at this time in the morning?”

“Of course!”

“Why--but--but you'll catch your death of cold.”

Wilbur stared at Ridgeway, then nodded helplessly, and, scratching his head, said, half aloud:

“No, what's the use; I can't make 'em understand. Good-night I'll see you in the morning.”

“We'll all come out and visit you on your yacht,” Ridgeway called after him; but Wilbur did not hear.

In answer to Wilbur's whistle, Jim came in with the dory and took him off to the schooner. Moran met him as he came over the side.

“I took the watch myself to-night and let the boy turn in,” she said. “How is it ashore, mate?”

“We've come back to the world of little things, Moran,” said Wilbur. “But we'll pull out of here in the morning and get back to the places where things are real.”

“And that's a good hearing, mate.”

“Let's get up here on the quarterdeck,” added Wilbur. “I've something to propose to you.”

Moran laid an arm across his shoulder, and the two walked aft. For half an hour Wilbur talked to her earnestly about his new idea of filibustering; and as he told her of the war he warmed to the subject, his face glowing, his eyes sparkling. Suddenly, however, he broke off.

“But no!” he exclaimed. “You don't understand, Moran. How can you--you're foreign-born. It's no affair of yours!”

“Mate! mate!” cried Moran, her hands upon his shoulders. “It's you who don't understand--don't understand me. Don't you know--can't you see? Your people are mine now. I'm happy only in your happiness. You were right--the best happiness is the happiness one shares. And your sorrows belong to me, just as I belong to you, dear. Your enemies are mine, and your quarrels are my quarrels.” She drew his head quickly toward her and kissed him.

In the morning the two had made up their minds to a certain vague course of action. To get away--anywhere--was their one aim. Moran was by nature a creature unfit for civilization, and the love of adventure and the desire for action had suddenly leaped to life in Wilbur's blood and was not to be resisted. They would get up to San Francisco, dispose of their “loot,” outfit the “Bertha Millner” as a filibuster, and put to sea again. They had discussed the advisability of rounding the Horn in so small a ship as the “Bertha Millner,” but Moran had settled that at once.

“I've got to know her pretty well,” she told Wilbur. “She's sound as a nut. Only let's get away from this place.”

But toward ten o'clock on the morning after their arrival off Coronado, and just as they were preparing to get under way, Hoang touched Wilbur's elbow.

“Seeum lil one-piece smoke-boat; him come chop-chop.”

In fact, a little steam-launch was rapidly approaching the schooner. In another instant she was alongside. Jerry, Nat Ridgeway, Josie Herrick, and an elderly woman, whom Wilbur barely knew as Miss Herrick's married sister, were aboard.