"I am here to offer my services, Señor Capitan. Can I be of any use? You may have a storm from the southward. To-day has been a weather-breeder. I think you have women on board. I could take them--"
"Gracias! gracias! my kind Señor Silencio. That will help me above all things."
"And if the wind does not rise, Señor Capitan, the tide will. Keep your engines backing, and there will be no harm done. I will take whom I can, and send for the others." Which proves that love, if not blind, may, however, be untruthful upon occasion.
How Silencio got Raquel over the side he never knew. Some one aided him at the captain's order, but he realized at last the blessed fact that she was there beside him, and that they were gliding from the vessel's hull as fast as he could impel the boat.
"Some miscreant has done this," roared the captain above the noise, as he leant over the side and strained his eyes after Silencio. "I beg you, Señor, to look for him, and when you have caught him, hand him over to me."
"I shall remember your words, Señor Capitan."
"I will have him shot in the market-place of the Port of Entry, and send for all the natives to see."
"I will remember your words, Señor Capitan, you may be sure of that, when I catch him--" But the last words of Don Gil were lost in the renewed efforts of the engineer to back the steamer from the sand spit.
No words passed at first between Raquel and her rescuer. If love is not always blind and sometimes not truthful, he is apt to be silent. Raquel needed no explanation. As the boat glided through the darkness, Silencio dropped the oars. He took her hands in his. His lips were pressed to hers. What question should she ask? What more did she crave to know? Here were life and liberty and love, in exchange for slavery, pollution, and worse than death.
When he lifted her slight form from the boat, he did not release her at once, but held her in his arms for a moment. He could hardly believe that his daring act had met with the one result for which he had hoped.
"Escobeda? In the cabin, ill. There is a slight swell. He is always ill. I had not noticed it, the swell, on board the steamer. But he is not my uncle, Señor."
"I have proof of it in his own written words, dear heart. But uncle or not, he shall never separate us now."