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Page 26
But the familiar sounds of the moving machinery had pierced through
Jarman's sluggish consciousness as no other sound in heaven or
earth could have done, and awakened him to the one dominant sense
he had left,--the habit of duty. She heard him roll from the bed
with an oath, stumble to the door, and saw him dash forward with an
affrighted face, and plunge his head into a bucket of water. He
emerged from it pale and dripping, but with the full light of
reason and consciousness in his eyes. He started when he saw her;
even then she would have fled, but he caught her firmly by the
wrist.
Then with a hurried, trembling voice she told him all and
everything. He listened in silence, and only at the end raised her
hand gravely to his lips.
"And now," she added tremulously, "you must fly--quick--at once; or
it will be too late!"
But Richard Jarman walked slowly to the door of his cabin, still
holding her hand, and said quietly, pointing to his only chair:--
"Sit down; we must talk first."
What they said was never known, but a few moments later they left
the cabin, Jarman carrying in a small bag all his possessions, and
Cara leaning on his arm. An hour later the priest of the Mission
Dolores was called upon to unite in matrimony a frank, honest-
looking sailor and an Italian gypsy-looking girl. There were many
hasty unions in those days, and the Holy Church was only too glad
to be able to give them its legal indorsement. But the good Padre
was a little sorry for the honest sailor, and gave the girl some
serious advice.
The San Francisco papers the next morning threw some dubious light
upon the matter in a paragraph headed, "Another Police Fiasco."
"We understand that the indefatigable police of San Francisco,
after ascertaining that Marco Franti, the noted gold-dust thief,
was hiding on the shore near the Presidio, proceeded there with
great solemnity, and arrived, as usual, a few hours after their man
had escaped. But the climax of incapacity was reached when, as it
is alleged, the sweetheart of the absconding Franti, and daughter
of a brother fisherman, eloped still later, and joined her lover
under the very noses of the police. The attempt of the detectives
to excuse themselves at headquarters by reporting that they were
also on the track of an alleged escaped Sydney Duck was received
with the derision and skepticism it deserved, as it seemed that
these worthies mistook the mail steamer, which they should have
boarded to get certain extradition papers, for a coasting steamer."
. . . . . .
It was not until four years later that Murano was delighted to
recognize in the husband of his long-lost daughter a very rich
cattle-owner in Southern California, called Jarman; but he never
knew that he had been an escaped convict from Sydney, who had
lately received a full pardon through the instrumentality of divers
distinguished people in Australia.
AN ESMERALDA OF ROCKY CANYON
It is to be feared that the hero of this chronicle began life as an
impostor. He was offered to the credulous and sympathetic family
of a San Francisco citizen as a lamb, who, unless bought as a
playmate for the children, would inevitably pass into the butcher's
hands. A combination of refined sensibility and urban ignorance of
nature prevented them from discerning certain glaring facts that
betrayed his caprid origin. So a ribbon was duly tied round his
neck, and in pleasing emulation of the legendary "Mary," he was
taken to school by the confiding children. Here, alas the fraud
was discovered, and history was reversed by his being turned out by
the teacher, because he was NOT "a lamb at school." Nevertheless,
the kind-hearted mother of the family persisted in retaining him,
on the plea that he might yet become "useful." To her husband's
feeble suggestion of "gloves," she returned a scornful negative,
and spoke of the weakly infant of a neighbor, who might later
receive nourishment from this providential animal. But even this
hope was destroyed by the eventual discovery of his sex. Nothing
remained now but to accept him as an ordinary kid, and to find
amusement in his accomplishments,--eating, climbing, and butting.
It must be confessed that these were of a superior quality; a
capacity to eat everything from a cambric handkerchief to an
election poster, an agility which brought him even to the roofs of
houses, and a power of overturning by a single push the chubbiest
child who opposed him, made him a fearful joy to the nursery. This
last quality was incautiously developed in him by a negro boy-
servant, who, later, was hurriedly propelled down a flight of
stairs by his too proficient scholar. Having once tasted victory,
"Billy" needed no further incitement to his performances. The
small wagon which he sometimes consented to draw for the benefit of
the children never hindered his attempts to butt the passer-by. On
the contrary, on well-known scientific principles he added the
impact of the bodies of the children projected over his head in his
charge, and the infelicitous pedestrian found himself not only
knocked off his legs by Billy, but bombarded by the whole nursery.
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