Argosy and Railroad Man's Magazine, Vol. 107 No. 3 — page 104: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

446 pared to the keen annoyance experienced by a house-breaker who unexpettedly cap- sizes a chair. The line of mistily sparkling lights on the Embarcadero was describing a grand semicircle, arching from right to left. Astern was impenetrable blackness. <A chilly wind, faintly odorous of the ocean, blew against Donn Riley’s cheeks, bearing with it the last. stinging. drops of the rain. Heaving a sigh of relief, Donn Riley entered the wireless cabin, shutting the door softly. The thumping of the ven- erable engine reassured him, somehow lend- ing to this utterly incredible venture a note of probability and reality. That they had actually cast off and pulled clear of the wharf convinced him that Captain’ Murdock, in spite of his anx- iety, would not be likely to falter in the tight pinches that the future might have in store for them. The Barracouda had gotten away neatly. Her captain had wasted no time. He had made up his mind and acted. And this, as he realized, was only the first of a series of daredeviltries to be flaunted in the face of - reason, not to mention a variety of mari- time statutes. For the time being, Donn Riley merely looked, listened, and marveled. He was reasonably sure that his part in these large proceedings was forthcoming shortly, just how quickly it was impossible to guess, un- less one knew precisely the inner workings of the reckless commander’s mind. He was conscious now of an inward glow of excitement, almost amounting to a chok- ing exultation. His past adventurings had been mere nibblings in comparison. This ship might be flying the black flag for all he knew of her mission. — He was one of the crew of an ocean ter- ror! on the most ticklish voyage of her extreme- ly dark career. The tidbit of these intros- pections, which he did not yet have the effrontery to consider calmly and fully, was, to be sure, the madcap daughter of his captain. How the tangled problem that her presence would create might be sifted, und solved, and reasonably answered, was “ow too obscure to contemplate. That a And she was bound, not improbably, © rational solution would eventually present itself, perhaps by the person most intri- cately concerned, was the simplest excuse at his command for sidestepping the issue. As he had expressed himself to the cap- tain, and as he still devoutly maintained to himself, the proposed plan of saving Ellen Murdock from the nauseous atten- tions of the Spanish consul, was a ridicu- lous proposal. He had no intentions now, nor would he when the crisis arrived, of shouldering the responsibilities embodied in the indubitably charming Miss ‘Mur- dock. He conceded that she was a splendid girl, a divinity no doubt. He could enu- merate, point by point, any number of her graces. The.sympathetic sweetness of her nature was known to him; it had been re- vealed by her voice, her gestures, her-very act, indeed. But he was quite sure, sus- ceptible to such feminine charms as he readily confessed himself to be, that her matchless perfection was not for him. Nor could it ever be. | The explanation he gave himself for this ARGOSY AND RAILROAD MAN’S MAGAZINE. j . “was of a few hours’ standing. In accord- ance with a whim, of a character génerated only by such imaginations as his, he had promised to the unresponsive head and shoulders of a young woman he had gazed upon in the dining-room of the Hotel St. Francis, to abstain from such vices as were known to corrode the soul of mankind. So deeply had the backward glimpse of this lovely creature been seared into the willing wax-of his resolutions; so obviously had her vital wholesomeness and virtue contrasted with his own faultiness, that he had in the strangest of fashions pledged himself to regenerate himself, simply in order that he might ocoupy a place of merit in the eyes of her—this girl whose features he might probably never gaze upon. Hours ago he had dismiss¢d as rankest heresy the intruding suspicion that the lovely head and shoulders of the girl in the St. Francis dming-room were the personal property of Ellen Murdock. Certain dis- coveries hinted that both might be one and the same, yet it was not his half doubt for these that caused him to dismiss the sus- picion. COM cloooks. com