Hawtrey's Deputy Part 13

Wyllard did not answer. He was gazing up at the bridge, and once more the whistle hurled out a great warning blast. It hardly seemed to her that the two vessels could pa.s.s clear of each other. Then Wyllard laid a hand upon her shoulder.

"The skipper's starboarding. We'll go round her stern," he said.

His grasp was rea.s.suring, and she watched the straining curves of canvas and line of half-submerged hull. It rose with streaming bows, swung high above the sea, sank again, and vanished with bewildering suddenness into a belt of driving fog. She was not sure that there had been any peril, but it was certainly over now, and she was rather puzzled by her sensations when Wyllard had held her shoulder. For one thing, she had felt instinctively that she was safe with him. She, however, decided not to trouble herself about the reason for this, and by and bye she looked up at him. The expression she had already noticed was once more in his face.

"I don't think you like the fog any more than I do," she said.

"No," said Wyllard, with a quiet forcefulness that almost startled her.

"I hate it."

"Why do you go as far as that?"

"It recalls something that still gives me a very bad few minutes every now and then. It has been worrying me again to-night."

"I wonder," said Agatha simply, "if you would care to tell me?"

The man looked down on her with a little wry smile. "I haven't told it often, but you shall hear," he said. "It's a tale of a black failure."

He stretched out a hand and pointed to the sliding fog and ranks of tumbling seas. "It was very much this kind of night, and we were lying, reefed down, off one of the Russians' beaches, when I asked for volunteers. I got them--two boats' crews of the finest seamen that ever handled oar or sealing rifle."

"But what did you want them for?"

"A boat from another schooner had been cast ash.o.r.e. It was blowing tolerably hard, as it usually does where the Polar ice comes down into the Behring Sea. They'd been shooting seals from her. We meant to bring the men off if we could manage it."

"Wouldn't one boat have been enough?"

"No," said Wyllard drily, "we had three, and I think that was one cause of the trouble. There was one from the other schooner. You see, those seals belonged to the Russians, and we free-lances could only shoot them clear off sh.o.r.e. I'm not sure that the men in the wrecked boat had been fis.h.i.+ng outside the limit."

Agatha did not press for further particulars, and he went on:

"We managed to make a landing, though one boat went up bottom uppermost," he said. "I fancy they must have broken or lost an oar then. We also got the wrecked men, but we had trouble while we were getting the boats off again. The surf was running in savagely, and the fog shut down solid as a wall. Any way, we pulled off, and went out with a foot of water in us, while one of the rescued men took my oar when I let it go."

"Why had you to let it go?"

Wyllard laughed in a rather grim fas.h.i.+on.

"I got my head laid open with a sealing club," he said. "Some of the rest had their scratches, but they managed to row. For one thing, they knew they had to. They had reasons for not wanting to fall into the Russians' hands. Well, we cleared the beach, and once or twice as I tried to bale there was a shout somewhere near us, and the loom of a vanis.h.i.+ng boat. It was all we could make out, for the sea was slopping into her, and the spray was flying everywhere. If there had only been two boats we'd probably have found out our misfortune, and perhaps have set it straight. As it was, we couldn't tell it was the same boat that had hailed us."

He broke off for a moment, and then added quietly, "Two boats reached the schooners. There was a nasty sea running then, and it blew viciously hard next day. There were three men in the other."

"Ah," said Agatha, "they were drowned?"

Wyllard made a little forceful gesture. "I'm not quite sure. That's the trouble. At least, the boat was nowhere on the beach next day, and it's difficult to see how they could have faced the sea that piled up when the gale came down. In all probability, they had an oar short, and she rolled them out when a comber broke upon her in the darkness."

The girl saw him close one hand tight as he added, "If one only knew!"

"What would have befallen them if they'd got ash.o.r.e?"

"It's difficult to say. In a general way, they'd have been handed over to the Russian authorities. Still, sealers poaching up there have simply disappeared."

He stopped again, and glanced out at the gathering darkness. "Now," he added, "you see why I hate the fog."

"But you couldn't help it," said Agatha.

"Well," said Wyllard, "I asked for volunteers, and the money that's now mine came out of those schooners. It's just possible those men are living still--somewhere in Northern Asia. I only know they disappeared."

Then he abruptly commenced to talk of something else, and by and bye Agatha went down to the saloon, where Miss Rawlinson, who had not been much in evidence during the voyage, presently made her appearance.

"Aren't you going into the music-room to play for Mr. Wyllard--as usual?" she said.

Agatha was almost disconcerted. She had fallen into the habit of spending half an hour or longer in the little music-room every evening, with Wyllard standing near the piano; but now her companion's question seemed to place a significance upon the fact.

"No," she said, "I don't think I am."

"Then the rest of them will wonder it you have fallen out with him."

"Fallen out with him?"

Winifred laughed. "They've naturally been watching both of you, and, in a general way, there's only one decision they could have arrived at."

Agatha flushed a little, but her companion went on:

"I don't mind admitting that if a man of that kind was to fall in love with me, I'd black his boots for him," she said. Then she added, with a whimsically rueful gesture, "Still, it's most unlikely."

Agatha looked at her with a little glint in her eyes.

"He is merely Gregory's deputy," she said, with a sub-conscious feeling that the epithet was not a remarkably fortunate one. "In that connection, I should like to point out that you can estimate a man's character by that of his friends."

"Oh," said Winifred, "then if Mr. Wyllard's strong points are merely to heighten Gregory's credit, I've nothing more to say. Anyway, I'll reserve my homage until I've seen him. Perfection among men is scarce nowadays."

She turned away, and left Agatha thoughtful. In the meanwhile, Mrs.

Hastings came upon Wyllard in the music-room. There was just then n.o.body else in it.

"You look quite serious," she said.

"I've been thinking about Miss Ismay and Gregory," said Wyllard. "In fact, I feel a little anxious about them."

"In which way?"

"Without making any reflections upon Gregory, I somehow feel sorry for the girl."

Mrs. Hastings nodded. "As a matter of fact, that's very much what I felt from the first," she said. "Still, you see, there's the important fact that she's fond of him, and it should smooth out a good many difficulties. Anyway, what we can call the material ones won't count.

She's evidently rather a courageous person."

The man sat silent a moment or two. "I wasn't troubling about them,"

he said. "I was wondering if she really could be fond of him. It's some years since she was much in his company."

"Hawtrey is not a man to change."

"That," said Wyllard, "is just the trouble. I've no doubt he's much the same, but one could fancy that Miss Ismay has changed a good deal since she last saw him. She'll look for considerably more than she was probably content with then."