warned of a sudden that the sun was near the zenith, paul hastened from the engine room aft. although he tried to go softly when he reached the poop for fear of waking emily he could not control the heels nor the squeaking of his new slop chest shoes. he heard her calling him before he was halfway to the wheel.
as he appeared in the lounge door she sat up in dumb fear. for the moment she did not recognize him in the rough blue shirt and corduroys and strange cap into which he had changed.
"it's i," he said, removing his cap with a smile.
"oh, paul—paul," she sobbed hysterically and covering her face as if to shut something unpleasant away from her. "i—i have had such—such a horrible dream. i——"
"there, there," he said comfortingly and going in to her. she caught hold of his hand. "everything's going to come out all right. you know you've been through an awful drive. if——i'm sorry i woke you. try to go back to sleep for another hour."
"i couldn't—i couldn't. i was dreaming that—that you were out there in the sea and that the ship was falling on you—pressing you down, down, down! it isn't true! it isn't true!"
her voice rose nearly to a shriek in her effort to reassure herself. he had won to his old control of himself.
"no, no, it isn't true. now listen: we're playing a big, big game here. you're my partner. the only one i can depend on——"
"forgive me—i don't mean to be selfish or thoughtless or whimpery—or the clinging-vine sort."
"it's all right. all right, partner. it's a wonder you've a nerve left. there are mighty few men who could have come through what you have and not be folded up now. but i want you to think of this game. it's so big, so big, that it's worth winning!" his tone, his expression, brought a smile of interest into her face. "if you think you can't sleep i want you to go down below and get into a heavy shirt like mine—the strongest, heaviest clothes you can find. i've pulled a lot out of the slop chest—socks and things. then, there's a little room—you'll find it in a corner of the skipper's. it's filled with a lot of woman's things. there's a cedar-wood chest——you will know what to take."
"a woman's things? there was a——"
"all i can say is that the daphne has known a woman's presence. when she was here—what has become of her—god knows."
"before i slept i said a prayer for her. and every time i lie down to rest i will pray for her safety."
emily stood up, but she hesitated as she started to descend the companionway.
"it's all right. there is nobody down there now. we're absolutely alone," paul said, noting her trepidation. "'home is the sailor, home from the sea, and the hunter home from the hill.'"
peace came to her spirit at the gentleness of his words and she went below unafraid.
by the noon sights which the daphne's new master got he fixed her position as latitude 33:18 north; longitude, 177:20 east. it astounded him. he worked his calculations over and over again according to a half-dozen different formul?. the result was the same, except for an unappreciable difference in longitude. so he made it 12 o'clock, setting the local time by an old-fashioned silver watch which he had discovered under the pillow in elston's berth.
assuming the correctness of his reckoning, the daphne was approximately two hundred miles north and west of where the cambodia had gone down. in the light of this he had to accept it as a fact that the island had drifted across the steamship lane. on the 29th the daphne had been in latitude 32:30 and longitude 176:28. he visualized that day on the island. there had been a light breeze from sunrise to sunset out of the northeast. with the going down of the sun it had begun to veer through the north until it brought out of the southwest. hove to on the port tack, the bark most have followed the hauling breeze until she had circled the island and then drifted up on it with the swell. it was the only satisfactory solution of which paul could think.
there came to him now, with redoubled force, a thought which had formed in the instant he had read in the log the port of the vessel's departure and her destination: "what can have caused a ship bound from sydney, new south wales, toward san francisco, to be steered so far to the westward?"
he was compelled to turn from the puzzle and admit that he was baffled.
during the half-hour preceding noon the swell had gone down considerably. the breeze still continued steady from the southwest. an aneroid barometer which he had discovered in the lounge, when he had spread emily's berth there, stood at an ordinary normal height. so he decided to hold on as the bark lay until after luncheon, then get under way, run before the wind for two hours, and take another altitude.
as paul turned away from the barometer hanging over the chart table, emily came up through the companionway. she wore a heavy blue flannel shirt such as he had told her to put on and a blue walking skirt which came to the tops of a pair of tan tennis shoes. she had plaited her hair again and wound it round her head like a crown. the shirt was unbuttoned at the throat, the cuffs rolled back. she presented a figure of beautiful, efficient womanhood where she paused at the head of the companionway, her arms half raised as if seeking paul's approbation. never since the first day he had seen her had she seemed so strongly feminine.
"you are the——" there he broke an exclamation. he halted in the step which he had taken toward her. emily waited, her eyes half lowered. when his voice broke she looked up in surprise. she was pale, despite the soft tan with which exposure had dusted her face and throat. with an embarrassed laugh paul went on: "you would make gunny cloth seem like the finest silk. never ship sailed the seas with such a chief mate."
it was a disingenuous, awkward speech. ill at ease he hurried on to tell her of the daphne's position by the observations he had just made; of the plans he had formed. all the while he talked, a thought, which had been with him ever since the moment of madness in the galley and which had lashed him all through the morning, sprinkled salt on the wounds in his conscience.
"i felt as if i were committing a sacrilege when i went into the little room where the cedar chest is," emily told him as they went forward to prepare luncheon. "the chest is filled with a girl's wedding things. the hat—the baby slip—i laid them away carefully and shut the lid on them."
she looked at the sea with a shudder. paul noticed this and realized that he must fight, too, to keep his companion's mind on pleasant things. he quickly directed her thoughts to the future, explaining the division of labor that must be theirs and the vigilance they must keep to win a triumph of the sea. her interest was enlisted more easily than he imagined it would be, for her thoughts were busy with a future which was calling her in all the beauty of life.
emily insisted upon preparing the luncheon, permitting paul only to shake up the fire. she did it well and, the while she was about it, he took the opportunity to re?xamine the daphne's log. he hoped to glean from it some things which might aid him in the navigation of the bark. it served, however, only to deepen the mystery.
it was a clean record of routine for two weeks after the departure from sydney. the crew had been received aboard on christmas night. it was not hard to visualize the condition of the lot on such a day—the sorriest day in the year for an outward-bound. the following morning she had sailed—three months and eight days gone, or, as elston had written at noon of the 29th: "our 96th day at sea from sydney." this was the 98th day.
the first thing to seize paul's professional eye importantly was the absence of any designation of second or third mate. if the daphne had sailed without these officers then they must have been recruited afterward from the forecastle gang. there was no telling from the names of the sixteen members of the crew who these might have been. the list comprehended every nationality under the sun.
at the end of the first two weeks three pages had been torn from the book. a week later another page was missing. there was not a week of the entire ninety-six days up to the hour of abandonment which was complete. of course, it was plain to lavelle that the man or men who had defaced the book had done so to destroy something that had been written against him or them.
"but why not have hove the book overboard and been done with it?" paul asked himself. he could not answer the question.
the daphne had spoken no other vessels; sighted no sail so far as the log disclosed. fair weather had attended her to the equator, which she had crossed on the fiftieth day out with a proper casting—longitude 119 west. this was in the track made by sailing vessels bound from australia to the west coast of the united states. then had followed calms until she had fallen in with the northeast trades in latitude 8 north, but there was no word to explain why she thereafterward had been steered into this western sea more than two thousand miles off the course she should have held!
emily's summons to luncheon made paul lay aside the log. it was a surprisingly good and substantial meal that she had whipped together. while they ate paul undertook the gold woman's drilling in the details of working a ship. on the island he and chang had filled in many a dreary minute with talk of ships. chang had taught her how to box the compass, and she was proud now, indeed, to exhibit this knowledge—eager to put it to use. her experience in the boat had taught her much, too. she surprised paul and made him proud of the intelligence with which she was able to comprehend his explanations.
"you're bully!" he exclaimed finally in admiration. "you're a woman with an efficient brain."
this little speech made emily glow with happiness. she had had many a pretty compliment addressed to her by artists at that game, but never one which gave her this pleasure. somehow she felt that thus he would have spoken to another man whose work he wished to praise. she understood that paul lavelle held order and efficiency above everything else. she was efficient in his sight. she fairly ran when he gave her the word to go aft and stand by the wheel.
the donkey boiler had made a full head of steam half an hour before. now paul started the engine which was connected with two hoisting drums protruding from each side of the forward house. he hoisted and hauled with these drums—set an additional headsail, and hauled his main yards round. within ten minutes he had the daphne bearing away to the northward with the wind over her port quarter. he ran aft and by hand swayed up the peak of the spanker as best he could. next he set the patent log which was trailing over the stern.
pausing to note the effect of the spanker he there and then stored in his memory the fact that with the peak down and a slight lee helm the daphne, with the canvas she was now carrying, would practically take care of herself hove to in a light breeze.
when he looked over emily's shoulder at the compass he could hear her heart beating wildly.
"how are you heading?" he asked with a slight brusqueness.
"northeast by north, half north," she answered accurately and with a sharp intake of the breath.
"keep her so."
all the gold woman could do was nod that she heard. the power of speech seemed to have gone from her. awe of the big fabric of iron and canvas and web upon web of ropes and gear obeying the impulse of her small hands was upon her. it was a big game. it was a terrific, intoxicating, joyous sensation. she had but one distinct thought: that was to go sailing on in the daphne—just she and this man alone—forever and ever. all the years of her past faded away—the moment obliterated their insignificance. her eyes, alight with love, went seeking the man's face and found him turned away from her, entering the lounge.
"rouse me at the slightest weather change—in two hours anyway," he called from within.
"i will," she managed to answer in a voice that seemed to belong to somebody else. she was trembling from head to foot with wonder—wonder of new strange forces clamoring through her being. the one thought which her comprehension dragged out of the riot and held was that this man through whom and by whom she lived trusted her so that he was lying down to sleep in her keeping; that he was depending upon her. her woman's soul cried out in the pride of possession.
