Page:Stewart Edward White--The Rose Dawn.djvu/77

Rh want to entertain in his home," he told the astonished Boyd. "I had to have some place for them."

Soon they reached the beach, a semicircle of yellow sands three miles long flanked by cliffs and rocks, with a lagoon running in from the sea, and small scattered shacks with drying nets and the odour of fish and abalone. A lazy surf dropped languidly. Sea birds wheeled and screamed or sailed in long steady processions across a tranquil sea. The smell of kelp was in the air.

It was low tide and the wet sands were exposed. On the hard, stoneless beach riding parties could be seen; and before them, when they galloped, the flash of white as of miniature snow squalls where the sanderlings wheeled in flight. The long swells rose and sucked back among the pilings of the wharf, draining and freshening the numberless barnacles, toredos, starfish, and sea urchins that crusted them; or lifting and letting fall their long sea tresses. The wharf was over a half mile long and ended in a platform that held many buildings, like a little city. The chestnuts trotted briskly over the hollow sounding boards.

"We're just about in time," observed the Colonel, pointing with his whip.

A cloud of black smoke was rising above the cliffs where the coast bent. After a moment the ship appeared and turned in toward the wharf. As she turned she fired a cannon. After a few seconds the report reached them; and after a long interval the echoes began faintly to return from the mountains. For Arguello had no railroad as yet. The traveller must either take a two days' stage ride, or come thus by water. The steamer was one of the most important facts in Arguello's life; and she knew it, and conducted herself accordingly with pomp and the firing of guns. Later, when the Southern Pacific completed its spur, she was content to sneak in quietly.

On the big platform at the end of the wharf quite a crowd was gathered. The long hotel busses had backed up side by side, and their runners were standing ready at their sterns. The Colonel drove alongside and stopped.

The steamer docked with the usual bustle and confusion, and the passengers streamed down the gang plank and toward the