for
miles on their starboard hand one radiant afternoon as they went below
to the captain's dinner, the last before reaching port. The sunshine had
been brilliant all the day, yet there came a chilly, shivering air
toward two o'clock, and the first officer shrugged his shoulders and
looked dubiously ahead, but gave no other sign. Gaily they drank the
skipper's health and pledged the Idaho in her best champagne. Long they
lingered over the table and laughter, jest and song and story enlivened
the hours that came to an end at last, and Pancha stole her little hand
within Loring's arm for the last starlight walk along the now familiar
decks, and lo, when they issued from the brightly-lighted saloon the
stars were gone, the steamer was forging ahead through a chill mist that
grew thicker with every moment, and as half-speed was ordered and the
mournful notes of the whistle groaned out throbbingly over the leaden
sea, she swayed uneasily over a heavy ground swell that careened her
deeper and deeper as the mist thickened to fog, and oilskins and
sou'westers came out and dark figures went dripping about the decks, and
Loring fetched his uniform cape from below and muffled in it Pancha's
slender form, and for awhile they tottered up and down, then abandoned
the attempt to walk, and settled in their chairs at the end of the
bench, just where she had sat and clung to the white stanchion and
sobbed her heart out that night in Guaymas Bay. _Ay de mi_--Pancha could
have sobbed almost as hard, though no longer in loneliness and
desolation--this very night.

As early as 9.30 Senora Valdez had gone below, following her lovely
nieces, and warning Pancha to come at once. It was too dark, too damp to
remain there longer, but Loring begged, and the Idaho lurched and rolled
sympathetically at the moment and the duenna found further argument
impossible. She had to rush for her room, and later to confide her
mandates as to Pancha to the stewardess, who came, peeped, and
considered them ill-timed. At six bells Turnbull and a few determined,
yet uncomfortable souls were consuming cognac and playing _vingt et un_
in the cabin, while the lookouts were doubled on the deck and every
ship's officer stood to his post. The sound of the muffled tinkle of the
bell roused Pancha from the silence that had fallen on the pair.

"I must go," she murmured for perhaps the twentieth time, and yet she
could not.

Once more, mournful, moaning, the deep-toned w