Lament guiding them, within five minutes they reached a point where El Avispa clung disconsolately to the keel of his upturned boat, bewailing the day of a birth which had developed for him into a life of unremitting sorrow. He was dragged into the police boat and ordered to explain himself. It was the fault of the foreign Señor, he deposed. Justice to himself compelled him to admit that, though he had every regard for the reputation of a cavalier who was now without doubt drowned fathoms deep below the very spot on which the rescuing pinnace swam. Being careless, or perchance engrossed by the attractions of the Señora who was for beauty a very swan, the amateur steersman had precipitated them among the mackerel nets. The rudder was fouled. He, Ignacio Baril, sometimes called El Avispa, had stood up to pass to the stern and release it. The Señora, with entrancing but unfortunate timidity, had risen in her turn, and the Señor, gesticulating in argument, had consummated the disaster. He had leaned sideways, lost his balance, and caused the boat to lurch completely over. Yes, he himself had put forth the efforts of a Hercules to save, at least, the woman. In deference to the memory of his mother, who was already among the Saints after a lifetime of charity and benevolence, he must bear witness to the fact that her son met this crisis with energy. How was he defeated? The truth must out; again it was the foreign cavalier. In his panic he had clutched and drawn back from the brink of safety the Señora--alas! to perdition. The would-be rescuer had desisted from his efforts only when his overtaxed lungs failed him. In a state of semi-unconsciousness, Providence had guided his aimless hand to reach and rest upon the keel of his overturned boat. He had been saved, it was very true, but it was a question if death itself was not to be poignantly preferred to safety coupled with such a burden of grief. His days must be clouded to his life's end. And thereupon the bay echoed with the shouts of a hundred searchers and the waters glittered in carnival gaiety below the glare of their lights. A couple of hours later one of them halted, as if to rest the rowers, in the shadow of the felucca _Santa Margarita_. From her bows a long, cord-lashed package was silently lifted on the larger vessel's deck, while three figures scrambled hastily over the gunwale and crept below. Then laboriously the clumsy anchor was hauled home, the broad sail spread to the western breeze, and Signor Luigi steered a straight course into the bosom of the night. CHAPTER XVIII THE SANTA MARGARITA'S LAZARET