The Pagan Madonna Part 31

"Get it yourself," said Flint.

Cunningham appeared small and boyish beside the ex-beachcomber.

"I'm speaking to you decently, Flint, when I ought to bash in your head."

The tone was gentle and level.

"Why don't you try it?"

The expectant men thereupon witnessed a feat that was not only deadly in its precision but oddly grotesque. Cunningham's right hand flew out with the sinister quickness of a cobra's strike, and he had Flint's brawny wrist in grip. He danced about, twisted and lurched until he came to an abrupt stop behind Flint's back. Flint's mouth began to bend at the corners--a grimace.

"You'll break it yourself, Flint, if you move another inch," said Cunningham, nonchalantly. "This is the gentlest trick I have in the bag.

Cut out the booze until we're off this yacht. Be a good sport and play the game according to contract. I don't like these side shows. But you wanted me to show you. Want to call it off?"

Sweat began to bead Flint's forehead. He was straining every muscle in his body to minimize that inexorable turning of his elbow and shoulder.

"The stuff is in Number Two bunker," he said, with a ghastly grin. "I'll chuck it over."

"There, now!" Cunningham stepped back. "I might have made it your neck.

But I'm patient, because I want this part of the game to go through according to schedule. When I turn back this yacht I want nothing missing but the meals I've had."

Flint rubbed his arm, scowling, and walked over to his bunk.

"Boys," said Cunningham, "so far you've been bricks. Shortly we'll be heading southeast on our own. Wherever I am known, men will tell you that I never break my word. I promised you that we'd come through with clean heels. Something has happened which we could not forestall. There is a woman on board. It is not necessary to say that she is under my protection."

He clumped out into the pa.s.sage.

"Well, say!" burst out the young sailor named Hennessy. "I'm a tough guy, but I couldn't have turned that trick. Hey, you! If you've got any hooch in the coal bunkers, heave it over. I'm telling you! These soft-spoken guys are the kind I lay off, believe you me! I've seen all kinds, and I know."

"Did they kick you out of the Navy?" snarled Flint.

"Say, are you asking me to do it?" flared the Irishman. "You poor b.o.o.b, you'd be in the sick bay if there hadn't been a lady on board."

"A lady?"

"I said a lady! Stand up, you scut!"

But Flint rolled into his bunk and turned his face to the part.i.tion.

Cunningham leaned against the port rail. These bursts of fury always left him depressed. He was not a fighting man at all and fate was always flinging him into physical contests. He might have killed the fool: he had been in a killing mood. He was tired. Somehow the punch was gone from the affair, the thrill. Why should that be?

For years he had been planning something like this, and then to have it taste like stale wine! Vaguely he knew that he had made a discovery. The girl! If he were poring over his chart, his glance would drift away; if he were reading, the printed page had a peculiar way of vanis.h.i.+ng. Of course it was all nonsense. But that night in Shanghai something had drawn him irresistibly to young Cleigh's table. It might have been the colour of her hair. At any rate, he hadn't noticed the beads until he had spoken to young Cleigh.

Gla.s.s beads! Queer twist. A little trinket, worthless except for sentimental reasons, throwing these lives together. Of course an oil would have lured the elder Cleigh across the Pacific quite as successfully. The old chap had been particularly keen for a sea voyage after having been cooped up for four years. But in the event of baiting the trap with a painting neither the girl nor the son would have been on board. And Flint could have had his noggin without anybody disturbing him, even if the contract read otherwise.

Law-abiding pirates! How the world would chuckle if the yarn ever reached the newspapers! He had Cleigh in the hollow of his hand. In fancy he saw Cleigh placing his grievance with the British Admiralty. He could imagine the conversation, too.

"They returned the yacht in perfect condition?"

"Yes."

"Did they steal anything?"

Cunningham could positively see Cleigh's jowls redden as he shook his head to the query.

"Sorry. You can't expect us to waste coal hunting for a scoundrel who only borrowed your yacht."

But what was the row between Cleigh and his son? That was a puzzler. Not a word! They ignored each other absolutely. These dinners were queer games, to be sure. All three men spoke to the girl, but neither of the Cleighs spoke to him or to each other. A string of gla.s.s beads!

What about himself? What had caused his exuberance to die away, his enthusiasm to grow dim? Why, a month gone he would burst into such gales of laughter that his eyes would fill with tears at the thought of this hour! And the wine tasted flat. The greatest sea joke of the age, and he couldn't boil up over it any more!

Love? He had burnt himself out long ago. But had it been love? Rather had it not been a series of false dawns? To a weepy-waily woman he would have offered the same courtesies, but she would not have drawn his thoughts in any manner. And this one kept entering his thoughts at all times. That would be a joke, wouldn't it? At this day to feel the scorch of genuine pa.s.sion!

To dig a pit for Cleigh and to stumble into another himself! In setting this petard he hadn't got out of range quickly enough. His sense of humour was so keen that he laughed aloud, with a gesture which invited the G.o.ds to join him.

Jane, who had been watching the solitary figure from the corner of the deck house and wondering who it was, recognized the voice. The cabin had been stuffy, her own mental confusion had driven sleep away, so she had stolen on deck for the purpose of viewing the splendours of the Oriental night. The stars that seemed so near, so soft; the sea that tossed their reflections. .h.i.ther and yon, or spun a star magically into a silver thread and immediately rolled it up again; the brilliant electric blue of the phosph.o.r.escence and the flash of flying fish or a porpoise that ought to have been home and in bed.

She hesitated. She was puzzled. She was not afraid of him--the puzzle lay somewhere else. She was a little afraid of herself. She was afraid of anything that could not immediately be translated into ordinary terms of expression. The man frankly wakened her pity. He seemed as lonely as the sea itself. Slue-Foot! And somewhere a woman had laughed at him. Perhaps that had changed everything, made him what he was.

She wondered if she would ever be able to return to the sh.e.l.l out of which the ironic humour of chance had thrust her. Wondered if she could pick up again philosophically the threads of dull routine. Jane Norman, gliding over this mysterious southern sea, a lone woman among strong and reckless men! Piracy! Pearls! Rugs and paintings worth a quarter of a million!

Romance!

Did she want it to last? Did she want romance all the rest of her days?

What was this thing within her that was striving for expression? For what was she hunting? What worried her and put fear into her heart was the knowledge that she did not know what she wanted. From all directions came questions she could not answer.

Was she in love? If so, where was the fire that should attend? Was it Denny--or yonder riddle? She felt contented with Denny, but Cunningham's presence seemed to tear into unexplored corners of her heart and brain.

If she were in love with Denny, why didn't she thrill when he approached?

There was only a sense of security, contentment.

The idea of racing round the world romantically with Denny struck her as absurd. Equally contrary to reason was the picture of herself and Cunningham sitting before a wood fire. What was the matter with Jane Norman?

There was one bar of light piercing the fog. She knew now why she had permitted Cleigh to abduct her. To bring about a reconciliation between father and son. And apparently there was as much chance as of east meeting west. She walked over to the rail and joined Cunningham.

"You?" he said.

"The cabin was stuffy. I couldn't sleep."

"I wonder."

"About what?"

"If there isn't a wild streak in you that corresponds with mine. You fall into the picture naturally--curious and unafraid."

"Why should I be afraid, and why shouldn't I be curious?"

"The greatest honour a woman ever paid me. I mean that you shouldn't be afraid of me when everything should warn you to give me plenty of sea room."

"I know more about men than I do about women."