r her reason for this unexpected
sally, but soon he decided she must be bent upon some mission. Then,
when he saw that she purposely avoided the village and was bending
toward the open palm-grove abreast of his anchorage, he knew she must be
going to a tryst. So Markeena was the sentinel! That fellow in the
mahogany _cayuca_ was her lover! Inocencio, the dissolute, felt a flame
of rage suffuse him. When, at last, his quarry emerged into the
mysterious half-light under the high roof of palms, and paused, he
strode after her. She gave the melancholy call of the night-bird that
had sounded in the breadfruit-tree over his head earlier in the evening;
then, seeing him close beside her, uttered a little cry of pleasure. Not
until he was too near for flight did she discover her mistake, and then
she seemed to freeze. Her utter silence was more menacing than a scream.

It was the instant for which he had schooled himself, so he spoke to her
in her own tongue.

"Make no outcry! I will not harm you."

She drew back, at which he laid his great, bony hand upon her, his eyes
blazing. She was deathly frightened, being little more than a child.

"I have waited for you many nights," he explained. "I feared you
would never come." Then, as she continued to stare up at him
uncomprehendingly, he ran on: "I am Inocencio, the trader. Every night
I have watched you at your work. I want you for my woman."

Her voice had forsaken her utterly, but she struggled weakly, so he
tightened his grip until his fingers sank into her flesh. She began to
gasp as if from a swift run; the open neck of her garment slipped down
over one shoulder; her eyes were distended until he saw them ringed
about with white. The terror of this tall yellow man with the hungry
eyes robbed her of power, and she let him drag her toward the lapping
water as if she were no more than some weak, wild thing that he had
trapped.

Of course she knew him, for, while the San Blas law may banish women, it
cannot blind them, and she, too, had studied him from concealment.
Although his words had made no impression whatever upon her, his grasp
and the direction he was drawing her had at last translated what was in
his mind. Then she burst into life. But she made no outcry, for it takes
strength to scream, and every atom of her force was directed against
his. She began to moan. Her every muscle writhed. With her free hand she
tore at his entwining fingers, but they were like jungle c