Owen Oliver

“ I taunted him, “but, if you do, some day I will put a knife into you—wait my chance to do it. I swear it, Carlos!”
“I SHALL not beat you,” he said. “Listen. Look out the window at the sea and the old hulk lying there. It shall be your home—your prison—for the rest of your days. A bare prison, a bare fare—and you like the good things of life, don't you, Jennie? You married me—even old me!—for them. There you will grow old, dull, withered. No one will ever come to you. I shall send your brother a certificate of your death—from our island fever; tell people here that you are dead ”

“ I did not altogether like being married. Still, I think it might have turned out all right, but for the men. I really didn't dislike Alvarez, who humored all my wishes; but he was fearfully jealous and the men wouldn't let me alone. Alvarez caught one trying to make love to me. He owned that, from what he heard, it wasn't my fault. If you knew how jealous he was, that would clear me! But he fought the man, and wounded him; and he, and Jack, said that I had better leave Videas for a time. So my husband took me to the biggest of the islands which he owned. ”

“ So I had just enough to live on. Jack wrote that Alvarez had I recovered from his wound. I did not hear from George Kaye. I thought it was because I was married. After a year I received news that Alvarez had died and that he had never altered the will which he had made when we were first married, leaving everything to me. So I was a rich woman—and free. I did not mind taking the money. I thought it only partly recompensed me for what I had suffered.
I expected that Kaye would come then, but he did not; and men kept asking me to marry them. ”

“ However, he put his arm between us, and I only wounded that. The two men who landed with him took the knife from me, and began to bind his arm. There were three men left in the boat, and I thought they looked unlovingly at him, and pityingly at me. I stepped into the boat.
“For the love of Heaven!” I cried. “If you are men——”
Suddenly one of them pushed the yacht off the reef, and into the wind, and we sailed away, leaving Alvarez and the other men swearing horribly.
They say that I tried to murder my husband, to run away with a man! ”

“ I took the sharp knife under my waterproof. I could not see any one on deck. I crept forward and began sawing at the huge rope which held us to the anchor. If I could cut that we might be blown where we should meet some vessel. If not—to death! I did not see that I had much to lose.
WHEN I was halfway through the rope, I looked behind me for the third or fourth time. The huge, half-witted man stood quite near, watching me and grinning. I threatened him with the knife, but he shook his head and pointed to the cable.
“Cut it,” he said. “You can only escape to death. ”

“ I am little, but I am strong. Mr. Montmorency took my part, and thrashed the man when he caught him hanging around the house afterward. He was very nice to me. I expect that was why Mrs. Montmorency took me back to my brother; though good old Charlie Montmorency was only fatherly to me.
The men made more trouble for me there, and Jack said I'd better go home. I talked about it to a man named Alvarez who had a lot of influence with Jack, and with everybody. He was very rich and owned a deal of property at Videas, and two or three islands, some way off the coast. ”

“ All the young men in our little village—father was the doctor—had been “soft” with me, from the time I was thirteen, but I had felt no inclination toward any of them; or toward any man until after I spoke to grandfather. Then, when I was nearly eighteen, I went over to Dunsterville for the fair, with a lot of young people from the village. There I saw a big, good-looking sailor, with a golden beard—a huge, devil-may-care fellow like you read of in books. ”

“ A woman can escape from it in a far country. I have; but some day my children may visit the place where I was born, or the place where I was first married, and find their mother called a pirate of men, a heartless coquette, or even worse. ”

“ Good or bad, you'll make my next year, this evening. I sail tomorrow afternoon. Give me half an hour to think of!”
“Oh!” I cried. “You men are all alike—silly! Very well. I shall be going home at ten. ”

“ I RAN away from the others just before ten, and let the man walk home with me. I noticed that he spoke better. He told me that his firm was giving him a chance to “get on,” and that he had been educating himself. He wanted me to promise to wait while he “rose to me.” Of course I wouldn't promise. I told him not to come again, but he said that he would come the next year. ”