There was no chance for Clay to speak to Hope again, though he felt the cruelty of having to leave her with everything between them in this interrupted state.But their friends stood about her, interested and excited over this expedition of smuggled arms, unconscious of the great miracle that had come into his life and of his need to speak to and to touch the woman who had wrought it.Clay felt how much more binding than the laws of life are the little social conventions that must be observed at times, even though the heart is leaping with joy or racked with sorrow.He stood within a few feet of the woman he loved, wanting to cry out at her and to tell her all the wonderful things which he had learned were true for the first time that night, but he was forced instead to keep his eyes away from her face and to laugh and answer questions, and at the last to go away content with having held her hand for an instant, and to have heard her say ``good-luck.''
MacWilliams called Kirkland to the office at the other end of the Company's wire, and explained the situation to him.He was instructed to run an engine and freight-cars to a point a quarter of a mile north of the fort, and to wait there until he heard a locomotive whistle or pistol shots, when he was to run on to the fort as quickly and as noiselessly as possible.He was also directed to bring with him as many of the American workmen as he could trust to keep silent concerning the events of the evening.At ten o'clock MacWilliams had the steam up in a locomotive, and with his only passenger-car in the rear, ran it out of the yard and stopped the train at the point nearest the cars where ten of the `Vesta's' crew were waiting.The sailors had no idea as to where they were going, or what they were to do, but the fact that they had all been given arms filled them with satisfaction, and they huddled together at the bottom of the car smoking and whispering, and radiant with excitement and satisfaction.
The train progressed cautiously until it was within a half mile below the fort, when Clay stopped it, and, leaving two men on guard, stepped off the remaining distance on the ties, his little band following noiselessly behind him like a procession of ghosts in the moonlight.They halted and listened from time to time as they drew near the ruins, but there was no sound except the beating of the waves on the rocks and the rustling of the sea-breeze through the vines and creepers about them.