Madge Morton's Victory Part 21

Madge smiled to herself. She felt as though she were in the witness box.

Was her dear old captain trying to cross-examine her?

"Of course, I like Tom better than almost any one else. He is awfully good to me. You know you like Tom yourself, so why shouldn't I?" she ended wickedly.

"I like him. Certainly I do. He is a fine, upright fellow and his money hasn't hurt him a mite, which you can't say of the most of us. But it's a different matter with you, young lady, and I want you to go slowly."

"But I am not going at all, Captain," laughed Madge. "It seems to me that I want only one thing in the world, and that's to find my father.

Sometimes I am afraid that perhaps I shall never find my father after all!"

Captain Jules coughed and his voice sounded rather husky. It had a different note in it from any that Madge had ever heard him use to her.

"Don't play the coward, child," he said sternly; "just because you have had one defeat don't go about the world saying you must give up. It may be that your father did that once and is sorry for it now. Keep up the fight. No matter how many times we may be knocked down in this world, if we have the right sort of courage we'll always get up again."

Madge sat up very straight. Her blue eyes flashed back at Captain Jules with an expression that he liked to see. "I am not going to give up my search," she answered defiantly. "One hears that it is Fate which separates two persons. If I find Father, I shall feel that I have won a victory over Fate. But I can't help longing to tell my father that I know that he is innocent of the fault for which he was disgraced and dismissed from the Navy, and that I have the proof in my possession that would make it clear to all the world as well as to me."

The old captain gave vent to a sudden exclamation that sounded like a groan. His face looked strangely drawn under his coat of tan.

"Are you sick, Captain Jules?" asked Madge hastily. "Do take my place and let me have the oars. I am sure I can row you."

Captain Jules smiled back at her. "What made you think I was sick?" he asked. "What was that you were telling me? How do you know that your father was guiltless of his fault? Why, Captain Robert Morton was one of the kindest men that ever trod a deck, and yet he was convicted of cruelty to one of his own sailors."

"Captain Jules," continued Madge earnestly, "I would like to tell you the whole story if you have time to listen to it. You know I promised long ago to tell you. Two years ago, when we were on the second of our houseboat excursions, we spent part of our holiday near Old Point Comfort. There I met the man who had been my father's superior officer.

Some unpleasant things happened between his granddaughter and me, and she told my father's story at a dinner in order to humiliate me. Long afterward her grandfather heard of what his granddaughter had done and he made a statement before my friends which cleared my father's name. He confessed to having allowed my father to suffer for something he had commanded him to do. My father was too great a man to clear himself at the expense of his superior officer, so he left the Navy in disgrace and has never been heard of since that dreadful time.

"There isn't much more to tell. Only the old admiral has died since I met him. However, he left a paper that was sent to me, in which he acquits my father of all blame and takes the whole responsibility for my father's act on himself. Must we go back home, Captain Jules?" for, at the end of her speech, Madge observed that the captain had turned his skiff and was rowing directly toward the houseboat. He handed Madge aboard a few moments later with the air of one whose mind is elsewhere.

It was impossible for Miss Jenny Ann to persuade the old pearl diver to remain to supper. With very few words to any of the party he turned Madge over to her friends and rowed hurriedly away toward his home.

CHAPTER XXIII

THE VICTORY OVER FATE

Early the next morning word was brought by a small boy that Captain Jules Fontaine wished Miss Madge Morton to come out to "The Anchorage" alone, as he had some important business that he wished to talk over with her.

It was a wonderful morning, all fresh sea breezes and sparkling suns.h.i.+ne.

Madge had not felt so gay in a long time as when the other houseboat girls fell to guessing as to why Captain Jules desired her presence at his house.

"He intends to make you his heiress, Madge," insisted Lillian. "Then, when you are an old lady, you can come down here to live in the house with the roof like three sails, and ride around in the captain's rowboat and sailboat and be as happy as a clam."

Madge shook her head. "No such thing, Lillian. I don't believe the captain wants me for anything important. He may be going to lecture me, as he did yesterday afternoon. At any rate, I'll be back before long.

Please save some luncheon for me."

Madge was surprised when her boat landed near "The Anchorage" not to see Captain Jules in his front yard, with his funny pet monkey on his shoulder, waiting to receive her. She began to feel afraid that the captain was ill. She had never been inside his house in all their acquaintance. But Captain Jules had sent for her, so there was nothing for her to do but to march up boldly to his front door and knock.

She lifted the heavy bra.s.s knocker, which looked like the head of a dolphin, and gave three brisk blows on the closed door.

At first no one answered. The little captain was beginning to think that the boy who came to her had made some mistake in his message and that Captain Jules had gone out in his fis.h.i.+ng boat for the day, when she heard some one coming down the pa.s.sage to open the door for her.

She gave a little start of surprise. A tall, middle-aged man, with a single streak of white hair through the brown, was gazing at her curiously.

"I would like to see Captain Jules," murmured Madge stupidly, unable to at once recover from the surprise of finding that Captain Jules did not live alone.

The strange man invited Madge into a tiny parlor which rather surprised her. The room was filled with bookshelves, reaching almost up to the top of the wall. The young girl had never dreamed that her captain was much of a student. The only things that reminded her of Captain Jules were the fishnets that were hung at the windows for curtains and the great sprays of coral and sponge which decorated the mantelpiece.

The man sat down with his back to the light, so that he could look straight into Madge's face.

"Captain Jules will be here after a little, Miss Morton," he said gravely, "but he wished me to have a talk with you first."

Madge looked curiously at the unknown man. She could not obtain a very distinct view of his face, but she saw that he was very distinguished looking, that his eyes seemed quite dark, and that he wore a pointed beard. He did not look like an American. At least, there was something in his appearance that Madge did not quite understand. It struck her that perhaps the man was a lawyer. It could not be that Lillian was right in her guess. The treasure in the iron safe had not yet been sold, so it might be that this man wished to make some offer for it. Whoever he might be the silence was becoming uncomfortable. The little captain decided to break it.

"I wonder if you wish to talk to me about the treasure that we found?"

she inquired, smiling. "I would rather that Captain Jules should be in here when we speak of that."

The stranger shook his head. He had a very beautiful voice that in some way fascinated the girl.

"No, I don't wish to talk about your treasure, but I do wish to speak of something else that was lost and is found again. I don't know that you will value it, child, or that it is worth having, but Captain Jules thinks you might."

Madge's heart began to beat faster. This strange man had something of great importance to tell her. She wondered if she had ever seen him anywhere before. There was something in his look that was oddly familiar.

But why did he look at her so strangely and why did not her old friend come to her to end this foolish suspense?

"I have been down here on a visit to Captain Jules a number of times this summer and he has always talked of you," went on the fascinating voice.

"I have longed to see you, but----Miss Morton, Captain Jules Fontaine and I knew your father once, long years ago. The news that you had proof of his innocence made us very happy last night."

Madge would have liked to bounce up and down in her chair, like an impatient child. Only her age restrained her. Why didn't this man tell her the thing he was trying to say? What made him hesitate so long?

"Yes, yes," she returned impatiently, "but do you know whether my father is alive now? That is the only thing I care about."

Madge gripped both arms of her chair to control herself. She was trembling so that she felt that she must be having a chill, though it was a warm summer day, for the stranger had risen and was coming toward her, his face white and haggard. Then, as he advanced into the brighter light of the room, Madge saw that his eyes were very blue.

"Your father isn't dead," the man replied quietly. "He is here in this very house, and he cares for you more than all the world in spite of his long silence!"

The little captain sprang to her feet, her face flaming. "Captain Jules!

_He_ is my father? He seemed so old that I didn't realize it. Yet he has said so many things to me that might have made me guess he knew everything in the world about me. Oh, where is he? My own, own Captain Jules?"

The stranger, whose arms had been outstretched toward Madge, let them fall at his sides, but Madge had no eyes for him. Captain Jules had entered the room and she had flung herself straight into his kindly arms.

So, after all, it was Captain Jules Fontaine who had to make it clear to Madge that he was not her father, but her father's lifelong and devoted friend. The captain told Madge the story while he held both her cold hands in his big, rough ones, and the man who was her own father sat watching and waiting for her verdict.

Jules Fontaine had never been captain of anything but a sailing schooner, but he had been a gunner's mate on Captain Robert Morton's s.h.i.+p. He alone knew that Captain Morton had been forced into the fault that he had committed by order of his admiral. When Captain Morton was dismissed from the United States Naval Service Jules Fontaine, gunner's mate, had procured his discharge and followed the fortunes of his captain. The two men drifted south to the tropics. Every American vessel is equipped with a diving outfit, and some of the men are taught to go down under the water to examine the bottoms of the boats. Jules Fontaine liked the business of diving. When the two men found themselves in a strange land, without any occupations, Captain Jules joined his fortunes with the pearl divers and for many years followed their perilous trade.

Captain Morton had a harder time to get along, but after a while he studied foreign languages and began to translate books. Five years before the two men had come back to the United States. Since that time Captain Morton had tried to follow every movement of his daughter. Captain Jules wanted his friend to make himself known to his own people, but Robert Morton feared that they would never forgive his long silence or his early disgrace. He believed that Madge would be happier without knowledge of him. It was her own longing for her father, reported by Captain Jules, that had impelled Robert Morton at last to reveal himself to her.

Madge could not comprehend all of this at once. She did not even try to do so. She realized only that, after being without any parents, she had suddenly come into two fathers at the same time, her own father and Captain Jules, who was her more than foster father.

With a low, glad cry she went swiftly across the room. She did not try to think or to ask questions at that moment about the past, she only flung her young arms about her father's neck in a long embrace, feeling that at last she had some one in the world who was her very own.