LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

foot of a white man has never yet trodden, and whose gorgeous wonders yet remain sealed books to the world—a city which the bold traveler Harry Savage Landor recently endeavored to reach but was forced to abandon the task as impossible.

      At present of course these things were hung up in abeyance, since his beloved country was at war with Spain, and called upon her patriotic sons to overwhelm the enemy, both in the field and under the guise of diplomacy.

      The pursuit of his business had taken him far out from the central part of the city and the river Liffey.

      From Donnybrook he had crossed to the region of Rathmines, where in an interview with one whose word carried great weight among the Fenian brotherhood, he learned that the mission of the Spanish schemers had failed.

      This was a matter of great importance to those faithful statesmen at Washington who labored to prevent any combination of European Powers against Young America—it meant that the great coalition would pull through and that poor Spain must take her drubbing.

      He had mounted to the upper deck of a tramcar and was on the way back to the city, surveying with considerable interest the names of the many villas, places and terraces, for every householder apparently desired to mark his residence by some appropriate designation.

      From this state of beatitude, superinduced by the clear consciousness of a day's work well done and the soothing effect of a good pipe, Roderic was without the least warning precipitated into a condition of tremendous excitement.

      He had just noted the old name on a rough stone gate post "Lucknow Bungalow," and was wondering if some gallant retired officer who had seen exciting days with Havelock, or later with gallant Roberts, might live in cozy retirement here, surrounded by objects brought from the far distant realm of Her Majesty the Empress of India, when some magnetism seemed to draw his gaze toward the romantic house set back a little from the road.

      Just at the same instant some one leaned out of an open window as if to close a shutter, some one whose personality acted upon Roderic very much as might a shock of electricity.

      Of course it was the girl from Porto Rico.

      That she saw him and recognized him Roderic realized instantly.

      It was another freak of Fate.

      When the three sisters who weave our destinies with distaff and loom, conspire against a poor mortal, there is little use trying to dodge the snare, since the loop falls over one's shoulders on the most unexpected occasions, and usually without warning.

      Roderic yielded, rescue or no rescue, at once.

      He immediately arose from his place and made down the winding stairs at the end of the car. The vehicle had been progressing meanwhile as rapidly as two sturdy Irish horses could draw it along the rails, and by the time the gentleman from across the Atlantic reached terra firma they were half a block away from the bungalow and its stone posts.

      Roderic had not developed any plan of action—what he did was from sheer impulse.

      The sight of her face had spurred him on—nor might this be set down as the only instance where a woman's lovely countenance caused unpremeditated action on the part of a usually conservative and well balanced man.

      When he reached the distinguishing stone pillars upon which he read the name of the villa, Roderic boldly turned in.

      Prudence might have dictated another course, for there was reason to believe, as both Darby and himself had discovered, that the old Porto Rican general, Georgia's uncle in fact, was allied with those who had endeavored to work the grand scheme.

      Therefore, he would not be apt to look upon any Yankee, and particularly Roderic Owen, with favor.

      General Porfidio to the contrary, the American strode past the sentinel posts, up the box bordered walk and directly to the front door.

      This was his nature, bold to a fault, ready to walk directly up to the cannon's mouth if duty but half demanded it.

      It was the Irish element in his blood, for where that strain goes throughout the peoples of the wide world, it carries with it devotion and gallantry.

      Before he could lay a hand upon the knocker, that represented a bronze Hindoo god, the door softly opened.

      A young girl stood there.

      As he looked at her, framed in the opening, with the light of the setting sun falling upon her wondrous face, Roderic held his very breath, for he was again under the spell of her dusky eyes, that ever wove a web of enchantment about him.

      Thus they stood, these two who had parted some years before—stood and stared and said not a single word for more than a full minute.

      What they lived over in those sixty seconds of time God only knows.

      Perhaps there came up before them a vision of Paradise Lost—of sweet scented flowers, flashing fountains, caroling birds—of a West Indian garden where the God of Love reigned, where the soft tinkle of magic mandolin accompanied songs of hottest devotion, where eyes looked into eyes and drank to the fill of heaven's nectar, where vows of constancy were fervently breathed and returned. Alas! how many times these same maddening memories arise to haunt broken hearts, for human nature is weak, and prone to wander afar after strange idols.

      Roderic recovered his voice, and while he still kept his eyes on her glowing face he said, quietly:

      "You expected me—you knew I would come?"

      "I believed you would when I saw you look this way," she admitted; and then added: "but I do not know why you are here, Senor Roderic."

      "Perhaps to thank you."

      "For what?" confused.

      "Your garb deceived me last night, but I knew the voice which you could not wholly disguise. I wish to tell you how—"

      "Stop. I do not desire to hear your gratitude. It was a duty with me. By chance I learned of the miserable plot. I could not bear to even see an enemy so badly used, much less one whom I once delighted to call—my friend."

      "Once—are we then no longer such?"

      "Senor, your welfare will always be regarded with interest by me," coldly.

      "You have condemned me unheard," with a gesture of despair.

      "Not I, senor, but yourself. The choice lay before you, and you decided to flee from San Juan—from Elysium. You were unjust—for once in your life. You alone, senor, condemned, not I."

      "But—was there no reason—I beg of you, I implore, an answer?"

      "Senor, this is a house where danger lurks for you—a house where plots are nightly considered against your people. It would be better for you to go away lest some of these hot headed Spanish sympathizers set eyes on you."

      "Let them go to the devil—what care I for all the Spaniards in Christendom. I shall stay here just as long as I like—as long as you allow me."

      "Ah! senor, but you did not always exhibit that same spirit—there was one Spaniard you feared worse than Satan does holy water."

      The spirit of coquetry ever lives in woman, and this girl could not resist giving poor Owen a little thrust even while her heart was wonderfully stirred by his presence.

      "Yes, Julio, the handsome bolero dancer, who had once been a famous toreador in Spain. As I hope for salvation I believe you favored his advances—you laughed at me when a denial was what I asked. Words followed, for my part in which may Heaven forgive me, and we parted in hot anger, we two who had been all in all to each other. Georgia, will you answer that question now?" he asked, holding her eyes enthralled by his eager gaze.

      She did not speak, only put out her hand and plucked him by the sleeve.

      It was only a gentle pull, but to Roderic Owen the power of a giant steam engine could not exert greater force.

      She meant that he should enter that East Indian bower—she

Скачать книгу