Part 5 (1/2)

Then it occurred to him that he was speaking more familiarly than an Englishman would probably expect a yacht-hand to do, and, pulling himself up abruptly, he commenced to lay out the table and pour the coffee.

”You take sugar, miss?” he asked.

”She does,” said the man dryly. ”When a spoon is not available she prefers her own fingers.”

The delicate girl laughed a little, and Jimmy felt his face grow warm, for he was conscious that her companion was watching him with quiet amus.e.m.e.nt; but he contrived to find the spoons he had forgotten, and when he was about to withdraw the girl with the brown eyes made a little sign.

”I suppose we are at liberty to read any of those books?” she asked, pointing to the hanging shelves. ”They are the skipper's?”

Jimmy knew what she was thinking, because the works in question were by no means of the kind one would have expected a professional yacht-hirer to own or to appreciate. He also knew that the forecastle slide was open, and that Valentine was probably listening.

”Of course, miss,” he said; ”take any of them, if you can understand them. I think it's more than the skipper does. Still, he has a little education, and bought them cheap at book sales. They give a kind of tone to the boat.”

”I see,” said the girl with the reposeful eyes, and Jimmy backed out in haste. He fancied a little ripple of musical laughter broke out after he had closed the forecastle slide. Then he glanced deprecatingly at Valentine, who did not appear by any means pleased with him.

”I didn't expect too much from you, but the last piece of gratuitous foolery might have been left out,” he said. ”Did you ever come across a yacht steward who took pa.s.sengers into his confidence in the casual way you do?”

”No,” said Jimmy candidly, ”I don't think I ever did. Now, I don't in the least know what came over me, but I can't remember ever losing my head in quite the same way before. It must have been the way the girl with the brown eyes looked at me. In fact, she seemed to be looking right through me. Who is she?”

”Miss Merril.”

”Ah!” said Jimmy, a trifle sharply. ”Still, it doesn't seem to be an unusual name in this country, and, after all, one couldn't hold her responsible for her father's doings--if she is the one I mean. It's quite possible they wouldn't please her if she were acquainted with them. In fact, it's distinctly probable.”

”I wonder why you seem so sure of that? She is the one you mean.”

”From her face. You couldn't expect a girl with a face like that to approve of anything that was not----”

He saw Valentine's smile, and broke off abruptly. ”Anyway, it doesn't matter in the least to either of us. What is she doing here, and who are the others?”

Valentine laughed. ”I don't think I suggested that it did. The man is Austerly, of the Crown-land offices, and English, as you can see--one of the men with a family pull on somebody in authority in the Old Country.

I believe he was a yacht-club commodore at home. The delicate girl's his daughter. Not enough blood in her--phthisis, too, I think--and it's quite likely she has been recommended a trip at sea. Miss Merril is, I understand, a friend of hers, and she evidently knows something of yachting too.”

”What do you know about phthisis?”

A shadow suddenly crept into Valentine's brown face. ”Well,” he said quietly, ”as it happens, I do know a little too much.”

Jimmy asked no more questions, but got his supper, and contrived to keep out of the pa.s.sengers' way until about ten o'clock that night, when he sat at the helm as the _Sorata_ fled westward before a fresh breeze. To port, and very high above her, a cold white line of snow gleamed ethereally under the full moon. A long roll tipped by flas.h.i.+ng froth came up behind her, and she swung over it with the foam boiling at her bows and her boom well off, rolling so that her topsail which cut black against the moonlight swung wildly athwart the softly luminous blue.

Jimmy was watching a long sea sweep by and break into a ridge of gleaming froth, when Miss Merril came out from the little companion and stood close beside him with the silvery light upon her. She had a soft wrap of some kind about her head and shoulders, and, though he could not at first see her face, the way the fleecy fabric hung emphasized her shapely figure.

”I wonder whether you would let me steer?” she asked.

For a moment or two Jimmy hesitated. The _Sorata_ was carrying a good deal of sail, and running rather wildly, while he knew that a very small blunder at the tiller would bring her big main-boom cras.h.i.+ng over, the result of which might be disaster. Still, there was something in the girl's manner which, for no reason that he could think of, impressed him with confidence. He felt that she would not have asked him for the helm merely out of caprice, or unless she could steer.

”Well,” he said, remembering he was supposed to be a yacht-hand, ”we will see what kind of a show you make at it, miss. Take hold, and try to keep her bowsprit on the island. It's the little black smear in the moonlight yonder.”

The girl apparently had no difficulty in doing it, though for a while he crouched upon the side-deck with a brown hand close beside the ones she laid on the tiller. Then as, feeling rea.s.sured, he relaxed his grasp, she appeared to indicate her hands with a glance.

”They are really stronger than you seem to think,” she said, ”and I have sailed a yacht before.”