第31章

On the northerly shore of San Francisco Bay a line of bluffs terminates in a promontory, at whose base, formed by the crumbling debris of the cliff above, there is a narrow stretch of beach, salt meadow, and scrub oak.The abrupt wall of rock behind it seems to isolate it as completely from the mainland as the sea before it separates it from the opposite shore.In spite of its contiguity to San Francisco,--opposite also, but hidden by the sharp re-entering curve of coast,--the locality was wild, uncultivated, and unfrequented.A solitary fisherman's cabin half hidden in the rocks was the only trace of habitation.White drifts of sea-gulls and pelican across the face of the cliff, gray clouds of sandpipers rising from the beach, the dripping flight of ducks over the salt meadows, and the occasional splash of a seal from the rocks, were the only signs of life that could be seen from the decks of passing ships.And yet the fisherman's cabin was occupied by Zephas Bunker and his young wife, and he had succeeded in wresting from the hard soil pasturage for a cow and goats, while his lateen-sailed fishing-boat occasionally rode quietly in the sheltered cove below.

Three years ago Zephas Bunker, an ex-whaler, had found himself stranded on a San Francisco wharf and had "hired out" to a small Petaluma farmer.At the end of a year he had acquired little taste for the farmer's business, but considerable for the farmer's youthful daughter, who, equally weary of small agriculture, had consented to elope with him in order to escape it.They were married at Oakland; he put his scant earnings into a fishing-boat, discovered the site for his cabin, and brought his bride thither.

The novelty of the change pleased her, although perhaps it was but little advance on her previous humble position.Yet she preferred her present freedom to the bare restricted home life of her past;the perpetual presence of the restless sea was a relief to the old monotony of the wheat field and its isolated drudgery.For Mary's youthful fancy, thinly sustained in childhood by the lightest literary food, had neither been stimulated nor disillusioned by her marriage.That practical experience which is usually the end of girlish romance had left her still a child in sentiment.The long absences of her husband in his fishing-boat kept her from wearying of or even knowing his older and unequal companionship; it gave her a freedom her girlhood had never known, yet added a protection that suited her still childish dependency, while it tickled her pride with its equality.When not engaged in her easy household duties in her three-roomed cottage, or the care of her rocky garden patch, she found time enough to indulge her fancy over the mysterious haze that wrapped the invisible city so near and yet unknown to her; in the sails that slipped in and out of the Golden Gate, but of whose destination she knew nothing; and in the long smoke trail of the mail steamer which had yet brought her no message.Like all dwellers by the sea, her face and her thoughts were more frequently turned towards it; and as with them, it also seemed to her that whatever change was coming into her life would come across that vast unknown expanse.But it was here that Mrs.Bunker was mistaken.

It had been a sparkling summer morning.The waves were running before the dry northwest trade winds with crystalline but colorless brilliancy.Sheltered by the high, northerly bluff, the house and its garden were exposed to the untempered heat of the cloudless sun refracted from the rocky wall behind it.Some tarpaulin and ropes lying among the rocks were sticky and odorous; the scrub oaks and manzanita bushes gave out the aroma of baking wood; occasionally a faint pot-pourri fragrance from the hot wild roses and beach grass was blown along the shore; even the lingering odors of Bunker's vocation, and of Mrs.Bunker's cooking, were idealized and refined by the saline breath of the sea at the doors and windows.Mrs.

Bunker, in the dazzling sun, bending over her peas and lettuces with a small hoe, felt the comfort of her brown holland sunbonnet.

Secure in her isolation, she unbuttoned the neck of her gown for air, and did not put up the strand of black hair that had escaped over her shoulder.It was very hot in the lee of the bluff, and very quiet in that still air.So quiet that she heard two distinct reports, following each other quickly, but very faint and far.

She glanced mechanically towards the sea.Two merchant-men in midstream were shaking out their wings for a long flight, a pilot boat and coasting schooner were rounding the point, but there was no smoke from their decks.She bent over her work again, and in another moment had forgotten it.But the heat, with the dazzling reflection from the cliff, forced her to suspend her gardening, and stroll along the beach to the extreme limit of her domain.Here she looked after the cow that had also strayed away through the tangled bush for coolness.The goats, impervious to temperature, were basking in inaccessible fastnesses on the cliff itself that made her eyes ache to climb.Over an hour passed, she was returning, and had neared her house, when she was suddenly startled to see the figure of a man between her and the cliff.He was engaged in brushing his dusty clothes with a handkerchief, and although he saw her coming, and even moved slowly towards her, continued his occupation with a half-impatient, half-abstracted air.Her feminine perception was struck with the circumstance that he was in deep black, with scarcely a gleam of white showing even at his throat, and that he wore a tall black hat.Without knowing anything of social customs, it seemed to her that his dress was inconsistent with his appearance there.

"Good-morning," he said, lifting his hat with a preoccupied air.

"Do you live here?"

"Yes," she said wonderingly.

"Anybody else?"

"My husband."

"I mean any other people? Are there any other houses?" he said with a slight impatience.

"No."