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That it was
past midnight, and Mary Standish had deliberately come to his room,
entering it and closing the door without a word or a nod of invitation
from him, seemed incredible to Alan. After his first explosion of
astonishment he stood mute, while the girl looked at him steadily and
her breath came a little quickly. But she was not excited. Even in his
amazement he could see that. What he had thought was fright had gone
out of her eyes. But he had never seen her so white, and never had she
appeared quite so slim and childish-looking as while she stood there in
these astounding moments with her back against the door.
The pallor
of her face accentuated the rich darkness of her hair. Even her lips
were pale. But she was not embarrassed. Her eyes were clear and
unafraid now, and in the poise of her head and body was a sureness of
purpose that staggered him. A feeling of anger, almost of personal
resentment, began to possess him as he waited for her to speak. This,
at last, was the cost of his courtesies to her, The advantage she was
taking of him was an indignity and an outrage, and his mind flashed to
the suspicion that Rossland was standing just outside the door.
In another
moment he would have brushed her aside and opened it, but her quiet
face held him. The tenseness was fading out of it. He saw her lips
tremble, and then a miracle happened. In her wide-open, beautiful eyes
tears were gathering. Even then she did not lower her glance or bury
her face in her hands, but looked at him bravely while the tear-drops
glistened like diamonds on her cheeks. He felt his heart give way. She
read his thoughts, had guessed his suspicion, and he was wrong.
"You--you
will have a seat, Miss Standish?" he asked lamely, inclining his head
toward the cabin chair.
"No. Please
let me stand." She drew in a deep breath. "It is late, Mr. Holt?"
"Rather an
irregular hour for a visit such as this," he assured her. "Half an hour
after midnight, to be exact. It must be very important business that
has urged you to make such a hazard aboard ship, Miss Standish."
For a moment
she did not answer him, and he saw the little heart-throb in her white
throat.
"Would
Belinda Mulrooney have considered this a very great hazard, Mr. Holt?
In a matter of life and death, do you not think she would have come to
your cabin at midnight--even aboard ship? And it is that with me--a
matter of life and death. Less than an hour ago I came to that
decision. I could not wait until morning. I had to see you tonight."
"And why
me?" he asked. "Why not Rossland, or Captain Rifle, or some other? Is
it because--"
He did not
finish. He saw the shadow of something gather in her eyes, as if for an
instant she had felt a stab of humiliation or of pain, but it was gone
as quickly as it came. And very quietly, almost without emotion, she
answered him.
"I know how
you feel. I have tried to place myself in your position. It is all very
irregular, as you say. But I am not ashamed. I have come to you as I
would want anyone to come to me under similar circumstances, if I were
a man. If watching you, thinking about you, making up my mind about you
is taking an advantage--then I have been unfair, Mr. Holt. But I am not
sorry. I trust you. I know you will believe me good until I am proved
bad. I have come to ask you to help me. Would you make it possible for
another human being to avert a great tragedy if you found it in your
power to do so?"
He felt his
sense of judgment wavering. Had he been coolly analyzing such a
situation in the detached environment of the smoking-room, he would
have called any man a fool who hesitated to open his cabin door and
show his visitor out. But such a thought did not occur to him now. He
was thinking of the handkerchief he had found the preceding midnight.
Twice she had come to his cabin at a late hour.
"It would be
my inclination to make such a thing possible," he said, answering her
question. "Tragedy is a nasty thing."
She caught
the hint of irony in his voice. If anything, it added to her calmness.
He was to suffer no weeping entreaties, no feminine play of
helplessness and beauty. Her pretty mouth was a little firmer and the
tilt of her dainty chin a bit higher.
"Of course,
I can't pay you," she said. "You are the sort of man who would resent
an offer of payment for what I am about to ask you to do. But I must
have help. If I don't have it, and quickly"--she shuddered slightly and
tried to smile--"something very unpleasant will happen, Mr. Holt," she
finished.
"If you will
permit me to take you to Captain Rifle--"
"No. Captain
Rifle would question me. He would demand explanations. You will
understand when I tell you what I want. And I will do that if I may
have your word of honor to hold in confidence what I tell you, whether
you help me or not. Will you give me that pledge?"
"Yes, if
such a pledge will relieve your mind, Miss Standish."
He was
almost brutally incurious. As he reached for a cigar, he did not see
the sudden movement she made, as if about to fly from his room, or the
quicker throb that came in her throat. When he turned, a faint flush
was gathering in her cheeks.
"I want to
leave the ship," she said.
The
simplicity of her desire held him silent.
"And I must
leave it tonight, or tomorrow night--before we reach Cordova."
"Is
that--your problem?" he demanded, astonished.
"No. I must
leave it in such a way that the world will believe I am dead. I can not
reach Cordova alive."
At last she
struck home and he stared at her, wondering if she were insane. Her
quiet, beautiful eyes met his own with unflinching steadiness. His
brain all at once was crowded with questioning, but no word of it came
to his lips.
"You can
help me," he heard her saying in the same quiet, calm voice, softened
so that one could not have heard it beyond the cabin door. "I haven't a
plan. But I know you can arrange one--if you will. It must appear to be
an accident. I must disappear, fall overboard, anything, just so the
world will believe I am dead. It is necessary. And I can not tell you
why. I can not. Oh, I can not."
A note of
passion crept into her voice, but it was gone in an instant, leaving it
cold and steady again. A second time she tried to smile. He could see
courage, and a bit of defiance, shining in her eyes.
"I know what
you are thinking, Mr. Holt. You are asking yourself if I am mad, if I
am a criminal, what my reason can be, and why I haven't gone to
Rossland, or Captain Rifle, or some one else. And the only answer I can
make is that I have come to you because you are the only man in the
world--in this hour--that I have faith in. Some day you will
understand, if you help me. If you do not care to help me--"
She stopped,
and he made a gesture.
"Yes, if I
don't? What will happen then?"
"I shall be
forced to the inevitable," she said. "It is rather unusual, isn't it,
to be asking for one's life? But that is what I mean."
"I'm
afraid--I don't quite understand."
"Isn't it
clear, Mr. Holt? I don't like to appear spectacular, and I don't want
you to think of me as theatrical--even now. I hate that sort of thing.
You must simply believe me when I tell you it is impossible for me to
reach Cordova alive. If you do not help me to disappear, help me to
live--and at the same time give all others the impression that I am
dead--then I must do the other thing. I must really die."
For a moment
his eyes blazed angrily. He felt like taking her by the shoulders and
shaking her, as he would have shaken the truth out of a child.
"You come to
me with a silly threat like that, Miss Standish? A threat of suicide?"
"If you want
to call it that--yes."
"And you
expect me to believe you?"
"I had hoped
you would."
She had his
nerves going. There was no doubt of that. He half believed her and half
disbelieved. If she had cried, if she had made the smallest effort to
work upon his sentiment, he would have disbelieved utterly. But he was
not blind to the fact that she was making a brave fight, even though a
lie was behind it, and with a consciousness of pride that bewildered
him.
She was not
humiliating herself. Even when she saw the struggle going on within him
she made no effort to turn the balance in her favor. She had stated the
facts, as she claimed them to be. Now she waited. Her long lashes
glistened a little. But her eyes were clear, and her hair glowed
softly, so softly that he would never forget it, as she stood there
with her back against the door, nor the strange desire that came to
him--even then--to touch it with his hand.
He nipped
off the end of his cigar and lighted a match. "It is Rossland," he
said. "You're afraid of Rossland?"
"In a way,
yes; in a large way, no. I would laugh at Rossland if it were not for
the other."
The other!
Why the deuce was she so provokingly ambiguous? And she had no
intention of explaining. She simply waited for him to decide.
"What
other?" he demanded.
"I can not
tell you. I don't want you to hate me. And you would hate me if I told
you the truth."
"Then you
confess you are lying," he suggested brutally.
Even this
did not stir her as he had expected it might. It did not anger her or
shame her. But she raised a pale hand and a little handkerchief to her
eyes, and he turned toward the open port, puffing at his cigar, knowing
she was fighting to keep the tears back. And she succeeded.
"No, I am
not lying. What I have told you is true. It is because I will not lie
that I have not told you more. And I thank you for the time you have
given me, Mr. Holt. That you have not driven me from your cabin is a
kindness which I appreciate. I have made a mistake, that is all. I
thought--"
"How could I
bring about what you ask?" he interrupted.
"I don't
know. You are a man. I believed you could plan a way, but I see now how
foolish I have been. It is impossible." Her hand reached slowly for the
knob of the door.
"Yes, you
are foolish," he agreed, and his voice was softer. "Don't let such
thoughts overcome you, Miss Standish. Go back to your cabin and get a
night's sleep. Don't let Rossland worry you. If you want me to settle
with that man--"
"Good night,
Mr. Holt."
She was
opening the door. And as she went out she turned a little and looked at
him, and now she was smiling, and there were tears in her eyes.
"Good night."
"Good night."
The door
closed behind her. He heard her retreating footsteps. In half a minute
he would have called her back. But it was too late.
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