Chapter 13

"Thank you. I know them all." She was looking at him now as if wondering why he did not make a start, but wild horses could not have dragged him away. Instead of picking up his gun, he inquired:

"May I rest a moment? I'm awfully tired."

"Certainly. You may stay as long as you wish. When you are rested the little path will bring you out."

"But you mustn't go!" he exclaimed, in a panic, as she turned away. "Oh, I say, please! You wouldn't do a thing like that?"

"I cannot speak to you this way, sir." The young lady blushed prettily.

"Why not, I'd like to know?"

"Oh!" She raised her hand and shook her head to express the absolute impossibility of such a thing. "Already I have been terrible. What will Stephanie say?"

"You've been nothing of the sort, and who is Stephanie?"

"She is a big black woman--very fierce. It is because of Stephanie that the fairies have gone away from here."

"If we wait a minute, maybe they'll come out."

"No. I have waited many times and I never saw them."

"Somehow I feel sure we'll see 'em this time," he urged. Then, as she shook her head doubtfully: "Good heavens! Don't you want to see 'em? I'm so tired that I must sit down."

The corners of her eyes wrinkled as she said, "You are not very strong, senor. Have you been ill?"

"Yes--no. Not exactly." He led her to a bamboo bench beside the palm hut. "I've been hunting. Now won't you please tell me how you chanced to be here? I thought these country places were unoccupied at this season."

"So they are. But, you see, I am doing a penance."

"Penance! You?"

"Oh yes. And it is nothing to laugh about, either," she chided, as he smiled incredulously, "I am a bad girl; I am disobedient. Otherwise I would not allow you to speak to me alone like this. You are the first gentleman I have ever been so long in the company with, Senor Antonio."

"Really?"

"Now I will have to do more penance." She sighed sadly, but her eyes were dancing.

"I don't understand this penance affair. What do you do?"

She lifted a fold of her coarse denim dress. "For six months I must wear these garments--no pretty ones. I must not go out in public also, and I have been sent here away from the city for a time to cure my rebellious spirit."

"Those dresses must be hot."

"Oh, very uncomfortable! But, you see, I was bad."

"Not very bad?"

"Indeed. I disobeyed my father, my uncle, everybody." For the first time her eyes grew bright with anger. "But I did not wish to be married."

"Now, I see. They wanted you to marry some fellow you don't like?"

"I do like him--"

"You did exactly right to refuse. By all means stand pat, and don't--"

"'Stand pat.' I have not heard that word since I was in Baltimore."

"It's awful to marry somebody you don't like," he declared, with such earnest conviction that she inquired, quickly:

"Ah, then are you married?"

"No! But everybody says it's positively criminal to marry without love."

"The gentleman is very handsome."

He shuddered, "Beware of handsome men. If you have any idea of marriage, select a large, plain man with blue eyes and light hair."

"I do not know such a person."

"Not yet, of course; that is, not well enough to marry him."

"It is not nice to speak of such things," said the young lady, primly. "And it is not nice also to speak with strange gentlemen who come out of the forest when one is doing penance. But I am a half American, you know. Perhaps that is what makes me so bad."

"Will you catch it for talking to me?"

"Oh yes. It is not allowed. It is most improper."

"Then I suppose I'd better leave." Anthony settled himself more comfortably upon the bench. "And yet there is nothing really wrong about it, is there? Why, it's done every day in my country. Besides, who's going to know?"

"The padre. I tell him everything."

"You girls down here have a pretty tough time of it; you are guarded pretty closely, aren't you?"

She gave him a puzzled look.

"I mean, you don't have any liberty. You don't go out alone, or let fellows take you to lunch, or to the matinee, or anything like that?"

Evidently the mere mention of such things was shocking. "Oh, senor," she cried, incredulously, "such terrible actions cannot be permitted even in your country. It is awful to think of!"

"Nonsense! It's done every day."

"Here it would not do at all. One's people know best about such things. One must be careful at all times. But you Americans are so wicked!"

"How does a fellow ever get acquainted with a girl down here? How does he get a chance to propose?"

But this frank questioning on so sacred a topic was a little more than the young lady was prepared to meet, and for the moment confusion held her tongue-tied.

"One's people attend to that, of course," she managed to say, at length, then changed the subject quickly.

"Do you live in Panama?" she asked.

"Yes. I work on the railroad, or will, in a few days."

"You are so young for such authority. It must be very difficult to manage railroads."

"Well--I won't have to run the whole works--at first. I'm beginning gradually, you know--one train at a time."

"That will be easier, of course. What did you say is your whole name?"

"Kirk Anthony."

"Keerk! It has a fonny sound, has it not?"

"I never noticed it. And yours?"

"Do you speak Spanish?" She regarded him curiously.

"Not a word."

"My name is Chiquita."

He repeated it after her. "It's pretty. What is your last name?"

"That is it. If I told you my first name, you could not use it; it would not be proper."

"It ought to be something like Ariel. That means 'spirit of the air and water,' I believe. Ariel Chiquita. No, they don't go together. What are you laughing at?"

"To see you scratch your neck."

Anthony became conscious of a growing sensation where the strange pod had dangled against his skin, and realized that he had been rubbing the spot for some time.

"You did not know it was the cow-nettle, eh?"

"You enjoy seeing me suffer," he said, patiently.

"You do not soffer," she retorted, mimicking his tone. "You only eetch! You wish me to sympathize."

"See here, Miss Chiquita, may I call on you?"

"Oh!" She lifted her brows in amazement. "Such ideas! Of a certainly not."

"Why?"

"You do not onderstand. Our young men do not do those things."

"Then I'll do whatever is customary--really I will, but--I'm awfully anxious to see you again--and--'

"I do not know you--My father--"

"I'll look up Mr. Chiquita and be introduced."

At this the young lady began to rock back and forth in an abandon of merriment. The idea, it seemed, was too utterly ridiculous for words. Her silvery laughter filled the glade and caused the jealous waterfall to cease its music.

"No, no," she said, finally. "It is impossible. Besides, I am doing penance. I can see no one. In the city I cannot even sit upon the balcony." She fetched a palpably counterfeit sigh, which ended in a titter.

Never had Kirk beheld such a quaintly mischievous, such a madly tantalizing creature.

"Say! You're not really going to marry that fellow!" he exclaimed, with considerable fervor.

She shrugged her shoulders wearily. "I suppose so. One cannot forever say no, and there are many reasons--"

"Oh, that's the limit. You'll go nutty, married to a chap you don't care for."

"But I am naughty, now."

"Not 'naughty'--nutty. You'll be perfectly miserable. There ought to be a law against it. Let me call and talk it over, at least. I know all about marriage--I've been around so many married people. Promise?"

"I cannot let you 'call,' as you say. Besides, for two weeks yet I must remain here alone with Stephanie." She regarded him mournfully. "Every day I must do my penance, and think of my sins, and--perhaps look for orchids."

He saw the light that flickered in the depths of her velvet eyes, and his heart pounded violently at the unspoken invitation.

"To-morrow?" he inquired, breathlessly. "Do you intend to hunt orchids to-morrow?"

Instead of answering she started to her feet with a little cry, and he did likewise. Back of them had sounded an exclamation--it was more like the snort of a wild animal than a spoken word--and there, ten feet away, stood a tall, copper-colored negress, her eyes blazing, her nostrils dilated, a look of utmost fury upon her face. She was fully as tall as Kirk, gaunt, hook-nosed, and ferocious. About her head was bound a gaudy Barbadian head-dress, its tips erect like startled ears, increasing the wildness of her appearance.

"Stephanie!" exclaimed the girl. "You frightened me."

The negress strode to her, speaking rapidly in Spanish, then turned upon Kirk.

"What do you want here?" she cried, menacingly. She had thrust her charge behind her and now pierced him with her eyes.

"Miss Chiquita--" he began, at which that young lady broke into another peal of silvery laughter and chattered to her servant. But her words, instead of placating the black woman, only added to her fury. She pointed with quivering hand to the path along the creek-bank and cried:

"Go! Go quick, you man!" Then to her charge: "You bad, BAD! Go to the house."

"Miss Chiquita hasn't done anything to make you huffy. I came out of the woods yonder and she was good enough to direct me to the road."

But Stephanie was not to be appeased. She stamped her flat foot and repeated her command in so savage a tone that Kirk perceived the uselessness of trying to explain. He looked appealingly at the girl, but she merely nodded her head and motioned him to be gone.

"Very well," he said, regretfully. "Thank you for your assistance, miss." He bowed to the little figure in blue with his best manner and took up his gun. "This way out! No crowding, please."

"Adios, Senor Antonio," came the girl's mischievous voice, and as he strode down the path he carried with him the memory of a perfect oval face smiling at him past the tragic figure of the Bajan woman. He went blindly, scarcely aware of the sun-mottled trail his feet were following, for his wits were a-flutter and his heart was leaping to some strange intoxication that grew with every instant.

It threatened to suffuse him, choke him, rob him of his senses; he wanted to cry out. Her name was Chiquita. He repeated it over and over in time to his steps. Was there ever such a beautiful name? Was there ever such a ravishing little wood-sprite? And her sweet, hesitating accent that rang in his ears! How could human tongue make such caressing music of the harshest language on the globe? She had called him "Senor Antonio," and invited him to come again to-morrow. Would he come? He doubted his ability to wait so long. Knowing that she agreed to the tryst, no power on earth could deter him.

What a day it had been! He had started out in the morning, vaguely hoping to divert his mind with some of those trite little happenings that for lack of a better term we call adventures in this humdrum world. And then, with the miraculous, unbelievable luck of youth, he had stumbled plump into the middle of the most wondrous adventure it was possible to conceive. And yet this wasn't adventure, after all--it was something bigger, finer, more precious. With a suddenness that was blinding he realized that he was in love! Yes, that was it, beyond the shadow of a doubt. This mischief-ridden, foreign-born little creature was the one and only woman in the world for whom the fates had made him and brought him across two oceans.

That evening he sat for a long time alone on the gallery of his hotel, his spirit uplifted with the joy of it, a thousand whispering voices in his ears. And when at last he fell asleep it was to dream of an olive, oval face with eyes like black pansies.

XIV

THE PATH THAT LED NOWHERE

When "Senor Antonio" awoke the next morning he lay for an instant striving to recall what it was that had haunted his sleeping hours, what great event awaited him. Then, as it rushed through his mind, he leaped out of bed and dashed headlong into the bath-room. This was to-morrow! It had been ages in coming--he recalled how even his slumbers had dragged--but it was here at last, and he would see Chiquita.

He sang as he stepped under his shower, and whistled blithely as he dressed himself. What a glorious country this Panama was, anyhow! How good it was to be young and to be in love! He never had been so happy. A man must be in love to sing before breakfast. But the afternoon was still a long way off, and he must be content to dream until the hour came.

He was too early for the Cortlandts, and he breakfasted alone. When he strolled out upon the veranda for his smoke he found Allan waiting for him, as usual. The Jamaican had not missed a morning so far, and it was only by a show of downright firmness that Kirk had been able to get rid of him at any time during the day. The black boy seemed bent upon devoting his every waking hour to his hero, and now, finding himself regarded with friendly eyes, he expanded joyously.

"Got you some games yesterday?" he inquired.

"Yes. And I'm going again to-day."

"Plenty games over yonder is, but it is very fatiguing to get them. To-day I go along for showing you the way."

"Not a bit like it. I'm going alone."

"Oh no, boss!"

"Oh yes, boss! I accidentally shot the last man I hunted with--killed him." Kirk stared tragically at his companion, but Allan was not to be so easily deterred.

"I shall pahss behind you, boss."

"I'd love to have you, of course--but I'm too careless."

"Praise God, you must not go h'alone in that case, or something will befall you! I shall h'imitate the birds and call them out before you to fire at."

"Fire AT! I don't fire at things, I hit 'em."

"Yes, sar. In that case we shall procure plenty of games."

"See here! I'm going alone, understand? I have an engagement with a Naiad."

"'Ow much a month will you be getting for such h'engagements?"

"Naiads don't pay in money, they give you smiles and kind words."

"Better you continue then as train collector. There is great h'opportunity for stealing."

"My job won't be ready for a few days, and meanwhile I have become a huntsman. I intend to go out every afternoon."

"H'afternoons is no good for wild h'animals; they are sleeping. Walk they in the h'early morning, for the most part, very quietly."

"That's true of some wood creatures, but the kind I hunt dance along the edges of pools in the afternoon. Say, did you ever feel like dancing?"

"No, sar."

"Come around on the back porch and I'll teach you a buck-step. I feel too good to sit still."

But Allan refused this proffer firmly. Such frivolous conduct was beneath his dignity.

"I 'ave h'important things to disclose," he said, mysteriously.

"Indeed."

"Yes, sar. Last night I dreamed."

"You've got nothing on me; so did I."

"I am walking on the h'edge of the h'ocean when I h'encountered a whale--a 'uge whale."

"Swam ashore to rest, I suppose?"

"No, sar; he was dead. It was very vivid."

"Well, what has a vivid dead whale to do with me?"

"This!" Allan brought forth a sheet of paper, which he unfolded carefully. "There is the number--the 'fish number,' sar."

"Why, this is a Chinese lottery advertisement."

"I got it for the very purpose. It would pay us to h'invest some money on the 'fish number.'"

"Nonsense! I don't believe in dreams. You say yourself they are false."

"Never such a dream as this, boss. It was very vivid."

"I've got no money."

Allan folded the paper disconsolately and thrust it into his pocket. "It is fartunate h'indeed," said he, "that you will be working soon, Master h'Auntony. And those P. R. R. was very fartunate also for getting you to h'accept a position, very fartunate h'indeed."

"Do you think I will raise the standard of efficiency?"

"Most of those railroad persons are vile people. They threw me h'off the train with such violence that my joints are very stiff and h'inflamed. I should h'enjoy being boss over them for a while."

"Why don't you ask for a job?"

"I have decided to do so, and I am asking you now for an h'engagement as brakesman."

"I can't hire you. Go to the office."

"Probably there are h'already brakesmen on your train."

"I have no doubt."

"In that case I shall ride with you as private person."

"Ride back and forth every day?"

"Those are my h'expectations, sar."

"That costs money."

"You will be collector," remarked the negro, calmly. "I should like to see those train people h'expel me, in that case."

"Well! I can see trouble ahead for one of us," laughed Anthony. "They don't allow 'dead-heads.'"

But Allan replied with unshaken confidence: "Then you should secure for me a pahss."

Kirk found it extremely difficult to escape from his persistent shadow that afternoon, and he succeeded only after a display of armed resistance.

It was the hottest part of the day when he set out, gun on arm, yet he never thought of the discomfort. After skirting the city, he swung into the fine macadam road that had brought him home the night before, and much sooner than he expected he arrived at the little path that led into the forest. He knew that he was trespassing again, and the knowledge added to his delight. As quickly as possible he lost himself in the grateful shade and followed the stream-bank with beating heart. His head was full of vague hopes and plans. He meant to learn the true story of Miss Chiquita's penance and find some means of winning her away from that other lover, of whom he had already thought more than once. He determined to make his love known without delay and establish himself as a regular suitor.

As upon the previous day, he broke into the glade before he suspected its presence, to find the same golden light-beams flickering in the shadowed depths and to hear the little waterfall chuckling at his surprise. There was the tree from which she had called to him, yonder the bench where they had sat together.

Of course, he was too early--he wanted to be, in order not to miss an instant of her company, so he seated himself and dreamed about her. The minutes dragged, the jungle drowsed. An hour passed. A thousand fresh, earthy odors breathed around him, and he began to see all sorts of flowers hidden away in unsuspected places. From the sunlit meadows outside came a sound of grazing herds, the deep woods faintly echoed the harsh calls of tropic birds, but at the pool itself a sleepy silence brooded.

Once a chattering squirrel came bravely rustling through the branches to the very edge of the enchanted bower, but he only sat and stared a moment in seeming admiration, then retreated quietly. A yellow-beaked toucan, in a flash of red and black and gold, settled upon a mirrored limb; but it, too, stilled its raucous tongue and flitted away on noiseless pinions as if the Naiads were asleep.

In the moist earth beside the bench Anthony saw the print of a dainty boot, no longer than his palm, and he promptly fell into a rhapsody. What tiny hands and feet she had, to be sure, and such a sweetly melancholy face! Yet she was anything but grave and gloomy. Why, the sunlight dancing on that waterfall was no more mischievous and merry than she. The slight suggestion of sadness she conveyed was but the shadow of the tropic mystery or the afterglow of the tragedy that had played so large a part in this country's history. The fact that she was half American perhaps accounted for her daring, yet, whatever the other strain, it could not be ignoble. Mrs. Cortlandt's figure of the silver threads in a rotting altar-cloth recurred to him with peculiar force.

But why didn't she come? A sudden apprehension overtook him, which grew and grew as the afternoon wore away.

It was a very miserable young man who wandered out through the fragrant path, as the first evening shadows settled, and bent his dejected steps toward the city. Evidently something had occurred to prevent her keeping her tryst, but he determined to return on the morrow, and then if she did not come to follow that other path right up to the house, where he would risk everything for a word with her. He wondered if she had stayed away purposely to test him, and the thought gave him a thrill. If so, she would soon learn that he was in earnest; she would find him waiting there every afternoon and--after all, why confine himself to the afternoon when she was just as likely to appear in the morning? He resolved to go hunting earlier hereafter, and give the whole day to it. Meanwhile, he would make cautious inquiries.

It was considerably after dark when he reached the hotel, and his friends had dined; but he encountered Mr. Cortlandt later. If Edith's husband suspected anything of what had occurred a night or two ago, his countenance gave no sign of it. For some reason or other, Kirk had not been troubled in the slightest by the thought that Cortlandt might be told. He could not imagine Edith making him the confidant of her outraged feelings. Besides, would such a strangely impassive person resent any little indiscretion in which his wife might choose to indulge? Kirk did not know--the man was a puzzle to him.

Cortlandt's voice was thoroughly non-committal as he inquired:

"Where have you been keeping yourself?"

"I've been hunting, to kill time."

"Any luck?"

"No, none at all. I started too late, I guess."

"By-the-way," continued the other, "your friend Allan has been besieging Edith, imploring her to use her influence to get him a position. He has set his heart upon going to work with you."

"He is becoming a positive nuisance. I can't get rid of him."

"I never saw such hero-worship."

"Oh, all niggers are hysterical."

"Let me give you a bit of advice, Anthony. Remember there are no 'niggers' and 'whites' in this country--they are both about equal. The President of the republic is a black man, and a very good one, too."

"That reminds me. I hear he is to be succeeded by the father of my friend, Alfarez."

Cortlandt hesitated. "General Alfarez is a candidate. He is a very strong man, but--"

"I am glad there is a 'but.'"

"It isn't settled, by any means. The successful candidate will need the support of our government."

"I suppose the Alfarez family is one of the first settlers--Mayflower stock?"

"Oh, worse than that. The name runs back to Balboa's time. General Alfarez is very rich, and very proud of his ancestry. That is one thing that makes him so strong with the people."

"What are some of the other leading families?" Kirk artfully inquired.

"There are a number. The Martinezes, the Moras, the Garavels--I couldn't name them all. They are very fine people, too."

"Do you know the Chiquitas?"

Cortlandt's face relaxed in an involuntary smile.

"There is no such family. Who has been teaching you Spanish?"

"Really, isn't there?"

"'Chiquita' means 'very small,' 'little one,' 'little girl,' or something like that. It's not a family name, it's a term of endearment, usually."

Kirk remembered now how the girl's eyes had danced when she asked him if he spoke her language. It was just like her to tease him, and yet what a pretty way to conceal her identity!

"What made you take it for a proper name?"

"A-a little girl told me."

"Oh, naturally. All children are 'Chiquitas' or 'Chiquitos'--everything, in fact, that is a pet."

Kirk felt somewhat uncomfortable under the older man's gaze of quiet amusement.

"But these other families," he went on in some confusion--"I mean the ones like those you just mentioned--they sometimes intermarry with Americans, don't they?"

"No, not the better class. There have been a few instances, I believe, but for the most part they keep to themselves."

"How would a fellow set about meeting the nice people."

"He wouldn't. He would probably live here indefinitely and never see the inside of a Panamanian house."

"But there must be some way," the young man exclaimed in desperation. "There must be dances, parties--"