Dan Merrithew Part 19

"Oh, no, you're not," exclaimed the girl; "you're not to leave me alone on this horrid s.h.i.+p just yet. The hair can wait. I'll go with you.

If everything is as nice as this cabin I shall feel quite at home."

The cabin opposite the Captain's had been the mate's, and behind it was the mess cabin. Here the greater part of crockery and gla.s.s was shattered on the floor. An overturned bird-cage with a dead canary in it lay under the table.

"Well," said Dan, "we ought to be comfortable. Now, Miss Howland, I think you ought to go to your cabin and get off those damp skirts. I have got to take a look at the cargo, see what plans I can make to render us something else than a log on the sea, and nose about in the galley." He started. "By George! I had forgotten about food. That's rather important." He hastily left the cabin and started down the corridor, with the girl's warning not to be long following him.

First he stopped in the carpenter's room and secured the very thing he was looking for,--an axe. With this he broke down the door of the storeroom, which, as he had expected, was locked. There were a barrel of flour, tins of beef and of soups and vegetables, condensed milk, and a number of preserve jars filled with coffee.

Taking one of the jars in which he saw the coffee was ground he poured out a cupful and drew some water from a cask. Then going into the galley, he dug up a coffee-pot from the ma.s.s of cooking utensils which covered the floor, and proceeded to light a fire in the range. It was soon roaring, and Dan had just mixed the coffee and water when Virginia appeared at the door.

For an instant Dan hardly recognized the girl in her trim blue skirt, white sailor waist, open at the throat, and a red leather belt with a great bra.s.s buckle.

"You have done well," he said at length. "I had no idea you would be so fortunate."

"Yes, everything fits pretty well," laughed the girl, "except that the skirt is a trifle short, but of course that doesn't matter here.

That's not the point, though." She gazed at him sternly. "Who gave you permission to come in here and cook?"

As Dan looked at her in amazement she continued:

"Now see here, Captain Merrithew, we might just as well face our situation. This is no time for observance of the minor conventions or gallantry. We are s.h.i.+pwrecked. We are nothing more nor less than two human beings cast away on a derelict. You are to regard me, not as Virginia Howland, helpless, dependent, to be waited upon and watched over, but as you would Ralph Oddington or any one else were he in my place--as an a.s.sistant in the common cause of safety. I am going to help you in every way I can, and I am going to begin by establis.h.i.+ng myself as cook of this party from now on. Please don't imagine I can't cook. I attended a French culinary school for two seasons. And now--"

she stepped into the galley and seized Dan by the sleeve, drawing him gently toward the door--"won't you please go so that I shall have elbow room--this is such a tiny box of a place. Please!"

Dan hesitated no longer. Seizing his axe he left the galley and went forward. The mainmast had snapped about six feet below the truck; of the other two masts nothing was left but the stumps. He chopped away the wreckage hanging over the bow, including the bowsprit and foretopmast, and had made good progress in clearing away the forward deck when Virginia, standing in the doorway of the after cabin, called him.

"Breakfast, Captain," she cried. "Breakfast is served."

The girl was laughing excitedly as she led the way to the dining-cabin and seated herself in front of a great, steaming nickel coffee-pot.

Blus.h.i.+ng radiantly she pointed to the other chair.

"Sit down, Captain Merrithew." But Dan protested.

"Now, really, Miss Howland," he laughed, "I can just as--"

"Captain," interrupted Virginia, sharply, "don't be a goose. There--"

She began to pour the coffee. "It isn't really much of a breakfast,"

she added; "I shall do much better for luncheon. But, as it is--" she inclined her head with mock unction as she handed him his cup.

Dan never forgot that breakfast. It was one of those events which linger in memory, every detail indelibly stamped, long after more important pictures of the past have lost even a semblance of outline.

Sunlight flowed in through the portholes and rested on the red tablecloth and the glittering steel cutlery. For a centrepiece she had a half shattered clay flower-pot containing a geranium plant which she had picked up from the deck outside the woman's cabin. It was droopy and generally woebegone, but it served its purpose. In front of Dan was a heaping dish of toast artistically browned, and a generous gla.s.s jar of marmalade.

And opposite, smiling at him, talking to him as though they had breakfasted together for a number of years, was the most radiant girl he had ever looked upon. The simple costume was wonderfully effective.

The white, full throat and the curves of the neck running to the shoulders were revealed by the low rolling collar, and the hair coiled low shone with l.u.s.trous sheen.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Opposite, smiling at him, as though they had breakfasted together for years, was the radiant girl.]

Despite Dan's fears as to the manner in which their tenancy of the derelict might terminate, he abandoned himself to the sheer charm of it all. When he finally arose, ending a light, laughing conversation, the girl regarded him seriously.

"Now, Captain," she said, "I want to ask you something, and you must tell me truthfully. You have examined this vessel, and you have doubtless some idea as to what we are to do. Tell me the exact situation."

Dan looked her straight in the eye a moment, and the girl returned his gaze unflinchingly.

"I am perfectly honest," she said; "I want you to be."

"Well," said Dan, "first of all I'll tell you what I am going to try to do: I am going to try to sail this derelict into some port. There is enough of the mainmast standing to allow some sort of a sail, and we can't be so terribly far from land. Besides, this hold is filled with logwood and mahogany. Now this is a valuable cargo, worth at least fifty thousand dollars. The vessel herself isn't worth a great deal, but still something. Here is the point: if we take this vessel into port alone we can claim fifty per cent salvage, and we'll get it, too.

That means that we shall net, through our little experience, some twenty-five thousand dollars between us."

Virginia stepped toward him with a delighted exclamation. Dan raised his hand admonis.h.i.+ngly.

"But," he continued, "we must first get the vessel into port. Several things may prevent this. The chief preventive will be a storm. If G.o.d gives us good weather for three or four days that is all I ask. If He doesn't, then we--"

"Go on," said the girl.

"Then we must simply pray for small favors."

Virginia nodded gravely.

"I understand," she said. "I trust you, Captain." She looked at him fixedly. "Can you imagine how much I trust you? I shall be strong and brave and do exactly as you tell me." She started forward suddenly.

"What have you under your coat sleeves? Are your arms bandaged?" she cried. "And your neck, too?"

Dan laughed.

"It's nothing," he said. "My hands and arms and the back of my neck were pretty well scorched. I dug some picric acid out of the Captain's medicine chest and tied myself up a bit. I am all right now. The pain has all disappeared."

The girl flushed.

"And you didn't ask me to help you?"

"There was absolutely no need. Honestly, if I had needed to bother you I should not have hesitated. The flames did not touch me, you know, just their hot breath; the bandages do not amount to anything."

"Well," replied Virginia, shaking her head, "I don't like it one bit.

If I can do anything to repay you, however slightly, for all you have done for me, please give me the opportunity."

"I shall remember that," said Dan.

CHAPTER XIII

NIGHT ON THE DERELICT

When the sun that evening sank like a red ball behind the purple horizon, Dan laid aside various implements and went aft with the realization of a day well spent. He had cleared the deck. Using the mainboom and a goodly section of the tattered canvas he had improvised a capacious leg-of-mutton sail which flapped idly in the almost motionless air.

He found Virginia seated in a camp lounging-chair, with a paper-covered novel lying open face downward in her lap, gazing thoughtfully at the dusk which seemed rolling toward them over the sea like a fog.

"It was a beautiful sunset," she said; "but now it has gone, the ocean seems to have such a cruel, cold look. And there are whispering voices on the water."

She s.h.i.+vered slightly and looked at him half humorously.