The Coast of Adventure

CHAPTER XIV

SMOOTH WATER

There was no wind except the draught the steamer made as she lurched across the dazzling swell. Cuba floated like a high, blue cloud over the port hand, cut off from the water by a blaze of reflected light, and the broad Yucatan Channel, glimmering like silver, stretched ahead. The deck had been holystoned and well sluiced before sunrise and was not quite dry, and there was a slight coolness in the air where Evelyn Cliffe sat under the awning.

Macallister leaned on the rail near by, wearing a white cap with a mail company's badge, and a blue jacket over his greasy duck. He had given his dress some thought since the passengers came on board. Miguel stood at the wheel, barefooted, tall, and picturesque in spotless white, with a red cap and a red sash round his waist. A few big logs of hardwood that gave out an aromatic smell were made fast amidships.

"I suppose that lumber's valuable," Evelyn remarked.

"It depends upon whether ye want to buy or sell," Macallister replied. "They telt us good logs were scarce in Cuba, but I doubt we'll find demand is slack when we come to part wi' them."

"Then the trade can't be very profitable."

"It's just changing a shilling. Sometimes ye get a ha'penny over."

Evelyn laughed.

"Which one of you looks after business matters?"

"I'm thinking it will have to be Walthew. The lad shows a natural ability."

"But he's younger than Mr. Grahame – and probably has not had as much experience."

Macallister gave her a half-amused glance.

"The skipper's no' a fool, but when he makes a bargain he's frank and quick. States the fair price and sticks to it. He will not spend time in scheming how he can screw a few more dollars out o' the other man. Yon's a gift ye must be born with."

"Do you mean Mr. Grahame rather despises money-making?"

"No' that exactly," Macallister replied in a confidential tone. "But, ye see, he's a Grahame o' Calder Ha'."

"Oh! Is that a great distinction?"

"It depends on how ye look at things. His branch o' the family is maybe no' o' much importance noo, but in the old wild days the lairds o' Calder Ha' were chiefs on the Border. They guarded the moss roads, they kept the fords, and the kings at Stirling and Westminster noo bought their goodwill with presents and noo hanged a few o' the clan."

"And Calder Hall? Is it one of the rude stone towers you see pictures of?"

Macallister smiled.

"Calder Ha's bonny. The old tower stands, with the coat o' arms above the door, but a low, gray house with stone-ribbed windows runs back where was once the bailly wall. Below's a bit ragged orchard, the bent trees gray with fog, and then the lawn dropping to the waterside. Nae soft Southern beauty yonder; but ye feel the charm o' the cold, rugged North." He paused, and resumed with a reminiscent air: "I mind how I went to Calder Ha' when I was a young and romantic laddie fired by Scott and him who taught the wandering winds to sing; the tales o' the Ettrick shepherd were thought good reading then. After a bit plain speaking to the foreman o' a Clydeside engine shop, I was fitting spinning gear in a new woolen mill, and I left the narrow Border town on a holiday dawn.

"There was mist along the alders and a smell o' wet dust where the white road followed the waterside, but as the sun came ower the hills I took to the moor. Red it was like crimson velvet with the light upon the ling, rolling on to Cheviot-foot, with the brown grouse crying and the clear sky above. At noon I came down a bit water that tumbled in a linn, where rowans grew among the stones and the eddies were amber with the seeping from the peat. The burn got wider, the bare hills closed in; and then I came on Calder Ha' at a turning o' the glen. Black firs behind it, standing stiff like sentinels; the house with the tower in the middle on the breast o' the brae, and the lawn running doon to a pool. Then I kent why the Grahames loved it and would never sell, though many a rich man would have bought the place from them."

"Did you tell Mr. Grahame this?" Evelyn asked.

"Maybe it makes things easier that he thinks I dinna ken," said Macallister.

Evelyn agreed, for she saw that his reticence was caused by tactful sympathy. Afterward she was silent for a time. The Scot's admiration for the old Border house appealed to her. He had shown a taste and a half-poetical imagination that she had not suspected when they first met; but it was not of Macallister she was thinking. After all, it must be something to belong to a family with such traditions as clung about Calder Hall; but she must not dwell too much on this.

"Aren't we going slowly?" she asked.

"Coal's dear in the West Indies, and the slower ye go the less ye use. But if ye are tiring o' the trip, I might drive her a bit faster."

Evelyn glanced across the long undulations that were deep-blue in the hollows, and touched upon their summits with brilliant light. She liked to feel the easy lift as the Enchantress shouldered off the swell; the drowsy murmur at the bows and the rhythmical throb of engines were soothing. Then there was a pleasant serenity in the wide expanse. But she was honest with herself, and she knew that the beauty of the calm sea did not quite account for the absence of any wish to shorten the voyage.

"Oh," she said, "please don't burn more coal than is necessary. I'm quite content. I love the sunshine and the smooth water."

Macallister strolled away, but she saw his twinkling smile and wondered whether he was satisfied with her excuse.

Evelyn lay back in her steamer-chair, looking out over the glistening water and idly watching the white-caps far out at sea. She felt, rather than saw, Grahame approach. When she turned to him, smiling, he was close beside her, leaning against the rail. His pose was virile, and his expression marked by the quiet alertness she had learned to know. It suggested resolution, self-reliance, and power of command. These qualities were not obtrusively indicated, but Evelyn recognized them and wondered how much he owed to his being a Grahame of Calder Hall. Hereditary influences must be reckoned on.

"This is the first chance I've had to see you alone," he said. "I want to thank you for your help at the International."

"Was it useful?"

"Very useful. Your quickness and resourcefulness were surprising."

"That's a doubtful compliment," she laughed. "To me the affair was quite exciting. To feel that you're engaged in a conspiracy gives you a pleasant thrill."

"I wonder!" Grahame remarked rather grimly. "But may I ask – "

"Oh, I can't dissect the impulses that prompted me. No doubt, the hint of intrigue was attractive – and perhaps friendship counted too."

"And you took the excellence of my intentions on trust?"

"Well, there really was no time to question you, and judge if they were good. As a matter of fact, I'm no wiser now."

"No," he said. "On the whole, I think it's better that you shouldn't know."

"It looks as if I'm more confiding than you."

Grahame, studying her face, suspected disappointed curiosity and a touch of pique.

"Your confidence is yours, to give or withhold as you think best. Mine, however, belongs to others."

"Then there are a number of people in the plot!"

Grahame laughed.

"If it's any comfort for you to know, when you came to our rescue that night in Havana you helped a man who has made many sacrifices for a good cause."

"As you're too modest to mean yourself, you must be speaking of the gentleman with the pretty daughter."

"Yes, Doña Blanca is pretty; but I prefer the Anglo-Saxon type. There's a charm in tropical languor, but one misses the bracing keenness of the North." He quoted with a smile,

"Oh, dark and true and tender – "

"We may be true; one likes to think so. But I'm not sure that tenderness is a characteristic of ours."

"It's not lightly given, but it goes deep and lasts," Grahame answered.

When he left her a few minutes afterward, Evelyn sat thinking languidly. She found him elusive. He was frank, in a way, but avoided personal topics. Then, remembering the scrap of verse he had quoted, she reflected that he was certainly a Northerner in feeling; but was truth, after all, an essential feature of the type? To be really true, one must be loyal to one's inner self and follow one's heart. But this was risky. It might mean sacrificing things one valued and renouncing advantages to be gained. Prudence suggested taking the safe, conventional course that would meet with the approval of one's friends; but Romance stood, veiled and mysterious, beckoning her, and she thrilled with an instinctive response. Now, however, she felt that she was getting on to dangerous ground, and she joined Cliffe, who sat in the shade of the deckhouse, talking to Walthew; but they did not help her to banish her thoughts. Her father was a practical business man, and Walthew had enjoyed a training very similar to hers. It was strange that he should now seek adventures instead of riches, and stranger still that her father should show some sympathy with him.

An hour later Grahame found Macallister leaning on the rail, contentedly smoking his pipe.

"She's only making seven knots; you're letting steam down," he said.

"Weel," rejoined Macallister, "we're saving coal, and we'll be in Kingston soon enough. Then, Miss Cliffe's no' in a hurry. She's enjoying the smooth water; she telt me so."

Grahame looked hard at him.

"You have a dangerous love of meddling, Mack," he said.

"I'll no' deny it. For a' that, I've had thickheaded friends who've been grateful to me noo and then. What ye have no' is the sense to ken an opportunity."

"What do you mean by that?"

Macallister's manner grew confidential.

"She's thinking about ye and when a lassie goes so far – "

Grahame stopped him with a frown.

"I'd sooner you dropped this nonsense. It's a poor joke."

"Weel, if ye have no ambition! Selling guns to revolutionists is no' a remarkably profitable business, particularly if ye're caught, and I was thinking ye might do better. The girl's no' bad to look at; I've seen ye watching her."

"Not bad to look at!" Grahame checked himself. "We'll talk about something else."

"As ye like!"

Macallister took out a small, tapered piece of steel.

"This, ye ken, is a cotter, and the dago from the foundry put it in. He was a good fitter, but the pin's a sixty-fourth too small for the slot. Maybe it was carelessness; but there would have been trouble when the cotter shook out if Walthew hadna' heard her knocking. Yon lad has the makings o' an engineer."

Grahame looked thoughtful.

"Gomez was in Havana, and I dare say he has his agents and spies. Still, if he suspected anything, it would have been a better stroke to have watched and seized us when we had the arms on board. I'd expect him to see it."

"Weel," said Macallister grimly, "if I meet yon dago another time, I'll maybe find out something before I throw him off the mole. A good engine's nearer life than anything man has made, and wrecking her is as bad as murder."

"I don't think our opponents would stick at that," Grahame replied as he turned away.

Toward evening the barometer fell, and it grew very hot. There was no wind, the sky was cloudless, and the sea rolled back to the horizon without a ripple. For all that, there was a curious tension in the atmosphere, and Evelyn noticed that soon after Macallister came up for a few minutes and looked carefully about, thick smoke rose from the funnel. The girl's head felt heavy, and her skin prickly; and she saw that Grahame's hawk look was more noticeable than usual. He was, however, not fidgety, and after dinner he sat talking to her and Cliffe under the awning. The air was oppressively still, and a half-moon hung like a great lamp low above the sea.

About nine o'clock Cliffe went to his cabin to look for a cigar, and Evelyn and Grahame sat silent for a while, wrapped in the mystery of the night.

Evelyn was the first to speak.

"I suppose you don't expect this calm to last?" she asked in a hushed voice.

"I'd like it to last while you're with us. But I can't promise that," Grahame answered. "If we do get a breeze it will probably soon blow itself out."

Evelyn glanced at the sea.

"It doesn't look as if it could ever be ruffled," she said. "One likes smooth water – but it's apt to get monotonous."

"That's a matter of temperament, or perhaps experience. When you've had to battle with headwinds, you appreciate a calm."

"I don't know. So far, I've had only sunshine and fine weather, but then I've always clung to the sheltered coast. It's nice to feel safe, but one sometimes wonders what there is farther out."

"Breaking seas and icy gales that drive you off your course. Now and then islands of mystic beauty, but more often surf-beaten reefs. On the whole, it's wiser to keep in smooth water."

"Perhaps," Evelyn said skeptically. "Still, there's a fascination in adventure, if it's only as a test of courage, and one feels tempted to take a risk."

She rose with a laugh.

"I don't know why I talk like this! I'm really a very practical girl – not a sentimentalist."

She moved away, and Grahame, calling one of the men to furl the awning, went into the deckhouse and deliberately pored over a chart. There were times when it was not safe to permit himself to think of Evelyn.

CHAPTER XV

THE TORNADO

Evelyn was wakened by a peal of thunder, and as she drowsily lifted her head a blaze of lightning filled the narrow room. It vanished and there was another deafening crash. The darkness was now impenetrable, but the startled girl had seen that the deck was sharply slanted and her clothes hung at a wide angle to the paneling of the bulkhead. It was obvious that the Enchantress was listed down nearly on her beam ends. A confused uproar was going on, and Evelyn thought she could distinguish the beating of heavy rain upon the deckhouse. This, however, was only for a few moments, because the other noises swelled into an overwhelming din.

Dropping from her berth, she began to dress in the dark, but found it difficult to keep her footing on the slanted deck, which lurched and threw her against the lockers, while the planking worked and shook with the throb of engines. Evelyn could not hear them, but the strong vibration showed that they were running fast.

It cost her an effort to refrain from rushing out on deck. Buttons baffled her nervous fingers, the pins she tried to use instead doubled up, but she persevered. She would not leave her room until she was ready: if the worst came, she could not make an open-boat voyage in a disheveled state. That this should seem of importance did not strike her as curious then, but she afterward blushed as she remembered her determination to look as well as possible.

At last she opened the door and stepped out, ankle-deep in water. She was to lee of the deckhouse, and, seizing the hand-rail, tried to look about. The rain did not seem so heavy now, and the house sheltered her, although clouds of spray were flying across its top. A few feet away, the low bulwark was faintly distinguishable, but outside this there was only a dim glimmer of foam in the dark. The Enchantress had the wind and sea on her broadside. This surprised Evelyn, because it was not a safe position if the gale were as bad as it seemed. Then a shower of sparks leaped from the funnel and by the momentary light they gave she saw a white streak, cleanly cut off and slanting downward, at the crown of the escape pipe. Evidently, Macallister had raised more steam than he could use.

Wondering why Grahame had not brought the vessel head to wind, she moved aft cautiously, clinging to the rail, until she saw that the awning had broken loose from its lashings. Part of it thrashed about the deck, making a furious noise, but the rest, blown forward, had fouled the foresail boom, and was stretched tight, but distended like a half-filled balloon. Acting as a sail, it prevented the steamer from answering her helm. One or two very indistinct figures struggled with the canvas, but they seemed unable to master it, and Evelyn crept on until she could look through the skylight into the engine-room. It was here the real battle must be fought, for the cylinders that strained under top pressure were the vitals of the ship. She could see them shake, as if about to burst their fastening bolts and leap from the columns, as the big cross-heads banged up and down.

The iron room was well lighted, though the lamps hung at an alarming angle to the beams, and there was a confused glimmer of steel that flashed through the light and plunged into shadow. A half-naked man lay on a narrow grating, leaning down and touching a ponderous mass of metal as it swept past. In the momentary intervals before it came back he rubbed the bright slide it traveled on with a greasy swab, and the girl knew how important it was that nothing should get hot. The work was dangerous, because the least clumsiness might cost him his arm. When he stopped and turned sideways on the grating the light touched his face, and Evelyn started as she recognized Walthew.

He had enjoyed all the comforts and refinements to which she was accustomed, and it was from choice and not necessity that he was doing this rough, hazardous work. There were obviously people who did not attach an undue value to the ease that wealth could buy; this boy, for example, had left the safe, beaten track, and now, when still weak from fever, was taking the consequences without dismay. It looked as if there might be something wrong with her mother's philosophy; but she could think of this better when there was less risk of the steamer's foundering.

A man came along the deckhouse and put his arm round her waist as the ship gave a wild lurch. Evelyn laughed as she recognized her father. For a moment she had thought it was Grahame. Holding her tight, Cliffe moved on a yard or two, and then stopped at the corner of the house, where they could see something of what was going on.

It was lighter now that the rain had stopped, and presently a ray of moonlight traveled across the sea and touched the laboring vessel. Hove down by the pressure of the wind on deckhouse and awning, she had buried her lee bulwarks and lifted her weather side. Sheets of water blew across her, and the sea looked white as snow. It was not running high: the heavy rain had beaten down the swell; but it would soon rise, and unless the vessel could be brought head to wind the combers would sweep her deck.

As the beam of moonlight widened, the figures of the toiling men grew clear. One was clinging to the top of a tall stanchion in a grotesque monkey-like attitude, trying to cut loose the awning, for a knife sparkled in his hand. Another crouched on the deck with folds of the canvas in his arms. Miguel was bent over the wheel. The tenseness of his pose and his hard-set face suggested heavy muscular strain.