The Stowaway Girl Part 4

The girl had been ill, wracked in body and distraught in mind, with the added horror of knowing that rats were scampering over the deck close to her in the noisy darkness, but she summoned a half laugh at his words.

"You are still saying the wrong thing, Mr. Hozier," she murmured. "The _Andromeda_ will not put into Queenstown. From this hour I become a pa.s.senger, not a stowaway. My uncle knows now that I am here. Thank you, you need not hold me any longer. I have quite recovered. Captain c.o.ke is on the bridge, you said? I can find my way; this s.h.i.+p is no stranger to me."

And away she went, justifying her statements by tripping rapidly forward. The mere sight of her created boundless excitement among such members of the crew as were on deck, but the shock administered to Mr.

Watts was of that intense variety often described as electric. In the matter of disposing of large quant.i.ties of ardent spirits he was a seasoned vessel, and, as a general rule, the first day at sea sufficed to clear his brain from the fumes of the last orgy on sh.o.r.e. But, to be effective, the cure must not be too drastic. This morning, after leaving the bridge, he had fortified his system with a liberal allowance of rum and milk. Breakfast ended, he took another dose of the same mixture as a "steadier," and he was just leaving the messroom when he set eyes on Iris. Of course, he refused to believe his eyes.

Had they not deceived him many times?

"Ha!" said he, "a bit liverish," and he pressed a rough hand firmly downward from forehead to cheek-bones. When he looked again, the girl was much nearer.

"Lord luv' a duck, this time I've got 'em for sure!" he groaned.

His lower jaw dropped, he stared unblinkingly, and purple veins bulged crookedly on his seamed forehead. He was bereft of the power of movement. He stood stock-still, blocking the narrow gangway.

"Good morning, Mr. Watts. You remember me, don't you?" said Iris, showing by her manner that she wished to pa.s.s him.

A slight roll of the s.h.i.+p a.s.sisted in the disintegration of Watts. He collapsed sideways into the cook's galley, the door of which was hospitably open. Somewhat frightened by the wildness of his looks, Iris ran on, and dashed at the foot of the companion rather breathlessly. The keen air was already tingeing her cheeks with color.

When she reached the bridge, where Captain c.o.ke was propped against the chart-house, with a thick, black cigar sticking in his mouth and apparently trying to touch his nose, she had lost a good deal of the pallor and woe-begone semblance that had demoralized Hozier.

c.o.ke heard the rapid, light footsteps, and turned his head. At all times slow of thought and slower of speech, he was galvanized into a sudden rigidity that differed only in degree from the symptoms displayed by his chief officer. Certainly he could not have been more stupefied had he seen the ghost reported overnight.

"They told me I should find you here, Captain," said she. "I must apologize for thrusting my company on you for a long voyage, but--circ.u.mstances--were--too much for me--and----"

Face to face with the commander of the s.h.i.+p, and startled anew by his expression of blank incredulity, the glib flow of words conned so often during the steadfast but dreadful hours spent in the lazarette failed her.

"You know me," she faltered. "I am Iris Yorke."

Not a syllable came from the irate and astonished man gazing at her with such a bovine stolidity. His shoulders had not abated a fraction of their stubborn thrust against the frame of the chart-house. His hands were immovable in the pockets of his reefer coat. The cigar still stuck out between his lips like a miniature jib-boom. Had he wished to terrify her by a hostile reception, he could not have succeeded more completely, though, to be just, he meant nothing of the sort; his wits being jumbled into chaos by the apparition of the last person then alive whom he expected or desired to see on board the _Andromeda_.

But Iris could not interpret his mood, and she strove vainly to conquer the fear welling up in her breast because of the grim anger that seemed to blaze at her from every line of c.o.ke's brick-red countenance. In the struggle to pour forth the excuses and protestations that sounded so plausible in her own ears, while secured from observation behind the locked door of her retreat, she blundered unhappily on to the very topic that she had resolved to keep secret.

"Why are you so unwilling to acknowledge me?" she cried, with a nervous indignation that lent a tremor to her voice. "You have met me often enough. You saw me on Sunday at my uncle's house?"

"Did I?" said c.o.ke, speaking at last, but really as much at a loss for something to say as the girl herself. He had recognized her instantly, just as he would recognize the moon if the luminary fell from the sky, and with as little comprehension of the cause of its falling.

Of course, she took the question as a forerunner of blank denial. This was not to be borne. She fired into a direct attack.

"If your memory is hazy concerning the events of Sunday afternoon, it may be helpful if I recall the conversation between my uncle and you in the summer-house," she snapped.

Some of the glow fled from c.o.ke's face. He straightened himself and glanced at the sailor inside the wheel-house, whose attention was given instantly to the fact that the vessel's head had fallen away a full point or more from South 15 West owing to the easterly set of a strong tide. Vessels' heads are apt to turn when steersmen do not attend to their business.

"Wot's that you're sayin'?" demanded c.o.ke, coming nearer, and looking her straight in the eyes.

"I heard every word of that interesting talk," she continued valiantly, though she was sensible of a numbness that seemed to envelop her in an ice-cold mist. "I know what you arranged to do--so I have promised--to marry Mr. Bulmer--when the _Andromeda_--comes back----"

A light broke on c.o.ke's intelligence that irradiated his prominent eyes. His heavy lips relaxed into a cunning grin, and he flicked the ash off the end of the cigar with a confidential nod.

"Oh, is _that_ it?" he said. "Artful old dog, Verity! But why in--why didn't 'e tell me you was comin' aboard this trip? We 'aven't the right fixin's for a lady, so you must put up with the best we can do for you, Miss Yorke. Nat'rally, we're tickled to death to 'ave your company, an' if on'y that blessed uncle of your's 'ad told me wot to expect, I'd 'ave made things s.h.i.+p-shape at Liverpool. But, my G.o.d-father, wot sort of ijjit axed you to stow yourself away in the lazareet? Steady now; you ain't a-goin' to faint, are you?"

c.o.ke's amiability came too late. His squat figure and red face suddenly loomed into a gigantic indistinctness in the girl's eyes. She would have fallen to the deck had not the captain's strong hands clutched her by the shoulders.

"Hi! Below there!" he yelled. "Tumble up, some of you!"

Hozier was the first to gain the bridge. He had followed the progress of events with sufficient accuracy to realize that Miss Iris Yorke had met with a distinct rebuff by the skipper, and, judging from his own experience of her physical weakness when she emerged into daylight, he was not surprised to hear that she had fainted.

"'Ere, take 'old," gurgled c.o.ke, who had nearly swallowed the cigar in his surprise at Iris's unforeseen collapse. "This kind of thing is more in your line than mine, young feller. Just lay 'er out in the saloon, an' ax Watts to 'elp. His missus goes orf regular w'en they bring 'im 'ome paralytic."

Philip took the girl into his arms. To carry her safely down the steep stairway he was compelled to place her head on his left shoulder and clasp her tightly round the waist with his left arm. Some loosened strands of her hair touched his face; he could feel the laboring of her breast, the wild beating of her heart, and he was exceeding wroth with that unknown man or woman who had driven this insensible girl to such straits that she was ready to dare the discomforts and deprivations of a voyage as a stowaway, rather than be persecuted further.

Iris was laid on a couch in the messroom, and the steward summoned Mr.

Watts. The chief officer came, looking sheepish. It was manifestly a great relief when he found that the "ghost" was unconscious.

"Oh, that's nothing," he cried, in response to his junior's eager demand for information as to the treatment best fitted for such emergencies. "They all drop in a heap like that w'en they're worried.

Fust you takes orf their gloves an' boots, then you undoes their stays an' rips open their dresses at the necks. One of you rubs their 'ands an' another their feet, an' you dabs cold water on their foreheads, an'

burn brown paper under their noses. In between whiles you give 'em a drink, stiff as you can make it. It's dead easy. Them stays are a bit troublesome if they run to size, but she's thin enough as it is.

Anyhow, I can show you a fine trick for that. Just turn her over till I cast a las.h.i.+n' loose with my knife."

Watts was elbowed aside so unceremoniously that his temper gave way.

Hozier lifted Iris's head gently and unfastened the neck-hooks of her blouse. He began to chafe her cold hands tenderly, and pressed back the hair from her damp forehead. The "chief," not flattered by his own reflections, thought fit to sneer at these half measures.

"She's on'y a woman like the rest of 'em," he growled, "even if she _is_ the owner's niece, an' a good-lookin' gal at that. I s'pose now you think----"

"I think she will want some fresh air soon, so you had better clear out," said Philip.

His words were quiet, but he flashed a warning glance at the other man that sufficed. Watts retired, muttering sarcasms under his breath.

Iris revived, to find Philip supporting her with a degree of skill that was remarkable in one who had enjoyed so little experience in those matters. She heard his voice, coming, as it seemed, rapidly nearer, urging her to sip something very fiery and spirituous. Instantly she protested.

"What are you giving me?" she sobbed. "What has happened?"

Then the whole of her world opened up before her. Her hands flew to her throat, her hair. She flushed into vivid life as the marble Galatea incardinated under Pygmalion's kiss.

"Did I faint?" she asked confusedly.

"Yes, but you are all right now. You did not fall. Captain c.o.ke caught you and handed you over to me. I wish you would drink the remainder of this brandy, and rest for a little while."

Iris pushed away the gla.s.s and sat up.

"You carried me?" she said.

"Well, I couldn't do anything else."

"I suppose you don't realize what it means to a woman to feel that she has been out of her senses under such conditions?"

"No, but in your case it only meant that you sighed deeply a few times and tried to bite my fingers when I wished to open your mouth."

"What for? Why did you want to open my mouth?"

"To give you a drink--you needed a stimulant."