"I'm not sure I understand."

Jacinta laughed musically. "Now," she said, "I really believe you do."

"Well," said Austin, with a doubtful smile, "if you think I went overboard of my own will to win your approbation, you are mistaken. I did not go at all. I was, in fact, thrown in. Macallister is, as you know, a somewhat persistent person."

"Ah!" said Jacinta. "That explains a good deal. Well, I feel almost tempted to be grateful to him for doing it, though you were, of course, sensible. There was really no reason why you should wish me to credit you with courage and humanity--especially when you didn't possess them."

Austin hoped she did not see that he winced, for although he had borne a good deal of her badinage, he felt his face grow hot. He was quite aware that this girl was not for him, and he had, he believed, succeeded in preventing himself falling in love with her. It seemed quite fitting that she should regard him as one of her servants, and since he could look for nothing more, he was content with that. He had, however, a spice of temper, and sometimes she drove him a trifle too hard.

"Still," he said, "if I ever did anything really worth while, I think I should insist upon your recognising it, though it is scarcely likely that I shall have the opportunity."

"No," said Jacinta, reflectively, "I scarcely think it is; but, after all, I have a little to thank you for. You see, you did delay the _Estremedura_. I suppose you have not seen Mr. Jefferson during the last half hour?"

"No," said Austin, with a little start of interest. "Has he----"

"He has. Muriel, at least, has evidently arrived at an understanding with him. I am not sure they saw me, but I came across them a little while ago--and they looked supremely happy."

There was satisfaction in her voice, but it was with a mildly ironical and yet faintly wistful expression she gazed at the shining sea. It somewhat astonished Austin, though there was so much about Jacinta that was incomprehensible to him.

"Well," he said, "I'm glad; but I should scarcely have fancied Miss Gascoyne would have attracted Jefferson. After all, one would hardly consider her a young woman who had very much in her. Indeed, I have wondered why you were so fond of her."

Jacinta smiled curiously as she looked at him. "She is wonderful to Jefferson. There is no grace or goodness that she is not endued with in his estimation."

"But if she doesn't possess them?"

"Then," said Jacinta, decisively, "because he believes she does, she will acquire them. There are women like that, you know, and I am not sure that sensible people like you and I don't lose the best of life occasionally. If a man believes a girl of Muriel's kind angelic she is very apt to unfold shining wings, though n.o.body else ever fancied that she had anything of the kind about her."

"Ah!" said Austin, who was a little stirred, though he would not admit it. "No doubt you know. A good many men must have thought that of you."

Jacinta laughed again. "No, my friend," she said. "I have met men who thought me amusing, and two or three who thought me clever--but that is a very different thing--while it is possible that the others remembered I was Pancho Brown's daughter. So, you see, my wings have not unfolded.

In fact, I sometimes think they are in danger of shrivelling away."

There was nothing that Austin could say, for he was the _Estremedura_'s sobrecargo, and had never forgotten that Pancho Brown was reputed to be making several thousand a year. Still, he found silence difficult, and changed the subject.

"Well," he said, "you haven't told me yet why you are so fond of Miss Gascoyne."

"She--is--good, and, after all, goodness really does appeal to some of us. Besides, when I went to an English school, a stranger, more Spanish than English in thought and sentiment, and most of the others held aloof from me, she saw I was lonely, and came and made friends with me. I was glad to cling to her then, and you see I haven't forgotten it."

There was a tone in the girl's voice which sent a little thrill through the man. It was very clear that Jacinta did not forget a kindness, and he had once or twice already had glimpses of her deeper nature. While he stood silent, and, as it happened, in the shadow, Miss Gascoyne came out of the door and approached Jacinta with the moonlight on her face.

Austin was almost startled as he glanced at her.

When he had last seen Muriel Gascoyne he had considered her a comely English girl without imagination or sensibility. She had, in fact, appeared to him narrow in her views, totally unemotional, and more than a little dull, certainly not the kind of young woman to inspire or reciprocate pa.s.sionate admiration in any discerning man. Now, as she came towards him with her eyes shining and the soft colour in her face, which was very gentle, she seemed transfigured and almost radiant. She stooped and kissed Jacinta impulsively.

"I am so happy, my dear," she said. "We owe ever so much to you."

Austin had the grace to wish himself somewhere else, though he did not see how he could get away, but Jacinta, with her usual boldness, turned in his direction.

"Well," she said, "I almost think you owe Mr. Austin a little, too. If he hadn't stopped the _Estremedura_ you would probably have been in Madeira now."

Again Muriel Gascoyne astonished Austin, for though it was evident she had not been aware of his presence, she showed no embarra.s.sment, and smiled at him with a simplicity which, though he had not expected it from her, had in it the essence of all womanly dignity.

"Yes," she said, "I realise that. Mr. Austin, Harry has been looking for you everywhere."

Austin made her a little grave inclination, and then, because she seemed to expect it, shook hands with her.

"I am glad that the man you have promised to marry is one of my friends," he said. "There is not a better one in these islands."

He did not remember what Miss Gascoyne said, and perhaps it was not of any particular consequence, but when she left them it happened that he and Jacinta did not look at one another. There was, in fact, an almost embarra.s.sing silence, and through it they heard the rhythmic swing of a soft Spanish waltz, and the deep-toned murmur of the sea. Then Jacinta laughed.

"I wonder what you are thinking?" she said.

Austin smiled, somewhat drily. "I was endeavouring to remember that there are a good many things the _Estremedura_'s sobrecargo must dispense with. It is exceedingly unlikely that anybody will ever leave me eight thousand pounds."

"I fancy there are a good many of us who would like to have a good deal more than we will probably ever get," said Jacinta. "It can only be a very few who ever hear the celestial music at all, and to them it comes but once in their life."

Austin looked at her quietly. "A little while ago I should not have considered Miss Gascoyne capable of hearing it; but now, and because I know the man she has promised to marry, I almost think she will, at least occasionally, be able to catch an echo of it. It must be difficult to hear that orchestra once and forget it."

Jacinta turned to him with a curious little smile in her eyes. "You and I are, of course, sensible people, and fancies of that kind have nothing to do with us. In the meanwhile, it is really necessary that I should appear in one or two of the dances."

Austin made a little gesture that might have expressed anything, and she rose and left him standing on the veranda.

CHAPTER IV

A BIG CONTRACT

It was the day after the dance at the Catalina, and Austin was running into Las Palmas harbour in a powerful steam launch which had been lent him to convey certain doc.u.ments to a Spanish steamer. The trade-breeze had veered a little further east that day, as it sometimes did, and the full drift of the long Atlantic sea came rolling insh.o.r.e. The launch was wet with spray, which flew up in clouds as she lurched over the white-topped combers that burst in a chaotic spouting on a black volcanic reef not far away from her. It also happened that the coaling company's new tug had broken down a few minutes earlier, and when the launch drove past the long mole the first thing Austin saw was a forty-ton coal lighter, loaded to the water's edge, drifting towards the reef. There was a boat astern of her, out of which a couple of Spanish peons seemed to be flinging the water, preparatory to abandoning the lighter to her fate, but Austin could see very little of the latter. The sea washed clean across her, and she showed no more than a strip of sluicing side amidst the spray.

What became of her was no business of his, but when the whistle of a big grain tramp rolling across the mouth of the harbour, and apparently waiting for her coal, roared out a warning, it occurred to Austin that the Spaniards in the boat might have considerable difficulty in pulling her clear of the reef against the sea. Accordingly, he unloosed the launch's whistle, and while it screeched dolefully, put his helm over and ran down upon the lighter. She was wallowing sideways towards the reef when he rounded up close alongside and saw, somewhat to his astonishment, that there was a man still on board. He was very black, though the spray was dripping from his face, and the seas that swept over the lighter's deck wet him to the knees. Austin shouted to him:

"I'll run round to leeward, Jefferson, so you can jump!" he said.

The wet man swung an arm up. "Stand by to take our rope. I'm not going to jump."

Austin considered. He was by no means sure that the launch had power enough to tow the lighter clear, and the long white seething on the jagged lava astern of her suggested what would happen if she failed to do it.

"Come on board. I haven't steam to pull her off," he said.

Jefferson made an impatient gesture. "If you want me, you have got to try."

Austin wasted no more time. It was evidently valuable then, and he knew his man. He signed to the Spanish fireman to back the launch astern, and clutched the rope Jefferson flung him as she drove across the lighter's bows.

"I can tow her just as well with you on board here," he roared.

"I guess you can," and a sea wet Jefferson to the waist as he floundered aft towards the lighter's stern. "Still, you're going to find it awkward to steer her, too."