"The details! Taking away from me all I have worked for--my reputation
as a master, my papers, my standing--my liberty. By the gods, I'm going
to live! I'm going through those breakers! I'll face that gang like a
man who has fought his way back from hell," raged the victim.
"This--this was none of my father's business! It could not have been,"
expostulated Miss Marston.
"Your father never knows anything about the details of Fogg's
operations," declared Bradish.
"He ought to know," insisted the maddened scapegoat. "He gives off his
orders, doesn't he? He sits in the middle of the web. What if he did
know how Fogg was operating?"
"Probably wouldn't stand for it! But he doesn't know. And the Angel
Gabriel himself wouldn't get a chance to tell him!" declared the clerk.
"A put-up job, then, is it--and all called high finance!" jeered Mayo.
"High finance isn't to blame for tricks the field-workers put out
so that they can earn their money quick and easy. What's the good of
pestering me with questions at this awful time? I'm going to die! I'm
going to die!" he wailed.
Miss Marston slid from the seat to her knees, in order that she might
be able to reach her hand to Mayo. "Will you let this handclasp tell
you all I feel about it--all your trouble, all your brave work in this
terrible time? I am so frightened, Captain Mayo! But I'm going to keep
my eyes on you--and I'll be ashamed to show you how frightened I am."
He returned the fervent clasp of her fingers with gentle pressure and
reassuring smile. "Honestly, I feel too ugly to die just now. Let's keep
on hoping."
But when he stood up and beheld the white mountains of water between
their little boat and the shore, and realized what would happen when
they were in that savage tumult, with the undertow dragging and the
surges lashing, he felt no hope within himself.
From the appearance of the coast he could not determine their probable
location. The land was barren and sandy. There seemed to be no inlet.
As far as he could see the line of frothing white was unbroken. The
sea foamed across broad shallows, where no boat could possibly remain
upright and no human being could hope to live.
Nevertheless, he remained standing and peered under his hand, resolved
to be alert till the last, determined to grasp any opportunity.
All at once he beheld certain black lines in perpendicular silhouette
against the foam. At first he was not certain just what they could be,
and he observed them narrowly as the boat tossed on its way.