little square piece of pasteboard, which he said had my father’s name printed on it; but he wouldn’t let me touch either.”
“Well, we must get them from him,” said Keefe.
“I don’t think it’s much matter, Keefe,” said Coral, hesitatingly. “I dare say, if it is true, my father does not care about me now.”
“I’ll answer for it, he’ll care about you when he sees you,” said Keefe.
“But what could I do among grand people in a great town?”
“You’d find new pleasures and new friends in a town, and you’d forget the old ones.”
She looked at him silently—a sad, wistful, reproachful look: it pained Keefe, and he turned away his head; but as he did so, a sight met his eyes which banished everything else from his mind.
O’Brien, whom he had left, as he thought, half dead, was standing in the creek unloosening the rope that made the boat fast. In another moment he would have succeeded, but Keefe reached him just in time to prevent him. When he found himself discovered, he dragged himself out of the water, without a word, and sat down on the bank, exhausted by the desperate exertions he had made, and looking ghastly from the blood that stained his face and clothes.
“O’Brien,” said Keefe, “you’re a most desperate villain; but I always knew that. I intended to have taken you back to Long Arrow, sooner than leave you here to die, though it’s my belief you’d be a worse passenger than Jonah in any craft that ever swam; but since I see you are so well able to look out for yourself, I suppose you want no help from me.”
“Don’t distress yourself about me,” said O’Brien, sarcastically; “I’ve got friends nearer than you think.”
“Well, before we part, just please to hand over that necklace of Coral’s, and the card with her father’s name on it.”
O’Brien was too firm and cool a villain not to submit quietly to inevitable ills, though none held a fiercer struggle with fate, while a hope of ultimate conquest remained; yet he found it hard to bear this stroke calmly. It was difficult to see the scheme, so subtly planned, destroyed without showing the rage he felt. He looked at Keefe fiercely, and was silent.
“If you don’t give them, I must take them,” said Keefe.
He knew himself powerless to resist; and subduing as best he could his impotent rage, he drew out a little pouch, and threw it to Keefe. Opening it, to make sure the necklace and card were there, Keefe called Coral to come to him.
“It’s your time now,” said O’Brien, “but mine may come again; and if ever it does, look to yourself, for no man that ever injured me, has lived to laugh at Hugh O’Brien’s revenge.”
“Injured you!” said Keefe, with his frank laugh. “I guess you may think yourself lucky that I let you off so easily. Come, Coral, the moon will soon be up, and the breeze is rising, we’d better be off.”
Coral looked at O’Brien.
“Keefe, he’s not strong enough to find his way through the wood; he’ll starve here.”
“He says he has got friends at hand,” said Keefe.
“Oh, I remember now, he said some Indians were to meet him here; but if they shouldn’t come?”
“They’ll come, never fear. However, I’ll leave him his rifle—it chances to be his own; he shan’t get it, though, till we’re out of his reach.”
He loosed the boat, shoved her into deep water, and set the sail; then he lifted in Coral, fired off the rifle, and threw it, with the powder horn and shot pouch, on shore. The next minute the breeze caught the sail, and the little skiff flew before it like a bird. Fancy could hardly imagine anything more lovely than that summer night’s sail, beneath the cloudless heaven, and over the moonlit lake. The wind was fair, and sped the little vessel rapidly along; the fragrant breath of spicy plants and sweet flowers was wafted from the shore, by which they sailed; the moon’s rays glistened on them, and threw an aerial charm over Coral’s fair face, as it peeped out from the canopy she had formed by throwing the skirt of her dress over her head; the fulness of bliss was in her heart, as she sat beside Keefe at the rudder, for the warm colouring of hope had tinged her life, and the dark cloud-land of futurity seemed breaking into verdant valleys, filled with perfume and song. Keefe had never seemed so kind to her as now; his voice had never been so soft, his look so gentle; and though his tenderness only sprang from pity, Coral, while she felt its sweetness, was happy. Her thoughts rested in a halcyon calm, and for that night’s brief space no haunting fear, no chilling doubt, came within their charmed circle.
How different were Keefe’s thoughts and emotions! An eager, restless longing to see the world, to taste its pleasures, and strive for its distinctions, had of late taken possession of him, and the very presence of his companion was almost forgotten as he revolved a thousand plans and projects in which she had no part, and any one of which, if realised, would have for ever divided them.
CHAPTER VIII.
