CHAPTER XVIII
REJECTED SACRIFICE
ONE horror was past, but even yet they dared not ride too rapidly, for the hamlet lay close at hand. It was scarcely likely that Don Ramon would have taken any of its inhabitants into his full confidence; still. Stone thought that there might be some one there who was intimate enough with the planter to be rendered doubtful by the unwonted spectacle of a party riding away from the hacienda in evident hurry. When Peña came, he would have nothing to lose by speed.
“Phew!”
Dan flicked the sweat from his forehead and wiped first one hand and then the other on a trouser leg. The second hand made those ten notes in his pocket crinkle significantly. He was a double fugitive, and he was both charged with killing and with having possession of counterfeit money.
During the succeeding moment's disgust, his impulse was to throw the false paper away, but second thought restrained him. Perhaps this evidence of Don Ramon's nefarious business, an offense against a friendly nation, would secure its holder a readier hearing by the Domingan authorities.
For Stone had resolved upon self-sacrifice. The girl, probably ignorant of law, and intent only on their escape from the hacienda's dangers, did not guess the full extent of his personal peril and must never be aware, until too late to prevent it, of the full scope of his proposed immolation, lest she jeopardize—as, knowing in time, she infallibly would—all of her safety for some degree of his. Gertruda's thoughts had to be kept from his own plight, because he had definitely decided to risk himself with the police in order to secure her from her embezzling uncle.
His plan was plain, and if they could out distance pursuit long enough, its execution ought to be simple. Luis must guide them by the briefest way to freedom from Peña's certain pursuit—the briefest way consistent with an avoidance of encountering the homeward-bound Villeta. Once safe from the chase, or reasonably sure not to be overtaken and brought back before reaching the officers of the law closest within call, the course would be laid direct to the Domingan capital. There he would tell Gertruda's story to the police—since his description had doubtless been sent out broadcast and the lookouts were everywhere—this would be tantamount to surrendering himself for the killing of Goldthwaite.
He looked at the girl. She wore the mantilla, but had forgotten to draw it lower than her hair. Her face was resolute, her chin held high; her black eyes shone. She was worth it!
The horses were familiar with this portion of their route. At an easy jog, they threaded their way through the garbage and refuse of the single street. Most of the inhabitants were, however, still sleeping heavily; only a few barefoot and half-clothed native children, some dark with Indian blood, more dark from the sun, stared at the cavalcade.
Dan turned in his saddle to the Carib. “Will they carry any warning of our escape to the hacienda?” He suspected spies everywhere.
Luis was less dubious. “Why should they?”
“They'll tell their parents that they've seen the señorita. They don't see her often nowadays, I suppose.”
“They would no more dare to wake their fathers than I should dare to wake a sleeping watchdog, señor. And if they did, what do those fathers know? Peña's wife lives beyond here. The danger lies not here. The danger will come when these children are questioned by Peña. They will point out our way to him; he will not have to ride through the pueblo slowly. If the hacienda servants had not Fernando, they would be helpless. If the señor had only let me kill him”
Dan interrupted: “Never mind that. There's probably a warrant out for me, but I'm not up to first-degree murder even yet.”
The Carib was pushing ahead rapidly, but Stone stayed him, though the village assumed a serpentine length that he found intolerable. The palm-thatched cabins panted in the heat; flies and mosquitoes lazily buzzed outside the motionless jalousies. Mother goats, in the cool of the doorways, would summon their overly energetic kids from danger under the horses' hoofs.
It was finished at last. Quit of the village, Luis turned them into a jungle trail, along which they proceeded with what speed it permitted, the fear of pursuit always close behind them, the dread of they knew not what interference ahead.
It was still possible for Dan to ride abreast of the girl, and he wanted to remain close to her as long as he could. Leave her he soon must, never to return—unless some miracle should clear his name. He thanked God that he had kept silent his love for her; he was even glad that he had not burdened her with any knowledge of the rôle she played in the heart of a man whom the world must regard and treat as a criminal, but he did desire her proximity as long as it was attainable, and he therefore kept close to her.
She had not spoken for some time. Dan wondered whether her thoughts were entirely occupied with the death of the gateman, yet he respected her reticence. Now, suddenly, she looked up, and his curiosity was almost immediately satisfied.
“What,” she asked in her precise English, “is to be our destination?”
He tried to smile. “Anywhere that Don Ramon is least likely to look. That's up to Luis; he knows the country.”
“But ultimately?” Her gaze was very steady.
Stone's, generally so frank, shifted. “I don't know.”
“You must have some plan.”
“There wasn't much time for planning. You told me to act and not think.”
“We cannot go on like this forever.”
As a high-school lad, he had read and loved Browning's “Last Ride Together.” Now that phrase of hers set the poem's concluding lines to ringing in his head:
What if heaven be that, fair and strong
At life's best, with our eyes upturned
Whither life's flower is first discerned,
We, fixed so, ever should so abide?
What if we still ride on, we two,
With life forever old yet new,
Changed not in kind, but in degree,
The instant made eternity—
And heaven just prove that I and she
Ride, ride together, forever ride?
He almost quoted the words, but he checked himself and stammered:
“I—we—I mean to get you to some reliable authority or other, somebody who'll look after your rights, get your fortune out of your uncle's fingers.”
“I do not think that he has left much of it,” she said; “but even if he has, I prefer only that we escape from this island.”
He felt her cool eyes reading his mind, but he made one more attempt at dissimulation. “Well, I hope to make your escape possible and to get your rights for you, too.”
She spoke quietly: “Señor, the police are seeking you. If you go to the authorities on my behalf, you will be giving yourself up to them. It should go without saying that I will not permit such a sacrifice for any fortune whatever.”
The blood mounted to Dan's temples. Embarrassment choked him, but remonstrance struggled against it in his throat. What, however, would have been the issue he was never to know, for at that moment the Carib, riding ahead, flung up a warning hand.
“Listen!”