The space through which Jane had passed held Dennison's gaze for two or
three minutes. Then he sat down on the companionway step, his arms across
his knees and his forehead upon his arms. What to say? What to do? She
expected him to be amusing!--when he knew that the calm on board was of
the same deceptive quality as that of the sea--below, the terror!
It did not matter that the crew was of high average. They would not be
playing such a game unless they were a reckless lot. At any moment they
might take it into their heads to swarm over Cunningham and obliterate
him. Then what? If the episode of the morning had not convinced Jane, what
would? The man Flint had dropped his mask; the others were content to wear
theirs yet awhile. Torture for her sake, the fear of what might actually
be in store for her, and she expected him to talk and act like a chap out
of a novel!
Ordinarily so full of common sense, what had happened to her that her
vision should become so obscured as not to recognize the danger of the
man? Had he been ugly, Jane would probably have ignored him. But that face
of his, as handsome as a Greek god's, and that tongue with its roots in
oil! And there was his deformity--that had drawn her pity. Playing with
her, and she deliberately walked into the trap because he was amusing! Why
shouldn't he be, knowing that he held their lives in the hollow of his
hand? What imp of Satan wouldn't have been amiable?
Because the rogues did not run up the skull and crossbones; because they
did not swagger up and down the deck, knives and pistols in their sashes,
she couldn't be made to believe them criminals!
Amusing! She could not see that if he spoke roughly it was only an
expression of the smothered pain of his mental crucifixion. He could not
tell her he loved her for fear she might misinterpret her own sentiments.
Besides, her present mood was not inductive to any declaration on his
part; a confession might serve only to widen the breach. Who could say
that it wasn't Cunningham's game to take Jane along with him in the end?
There was nothing to prevent that. His father holding aloof, the loyal
members of the crew in a most certain negligible minority, what was there
to prevent Cunningham from carrying off Jane?
Blood surged into Dennison's throat; a murderous fury boiled up in him;
but he remembered in time what these volcanic outbursts had cost him in
the past. So he did not rush to the chart house. Cunningham would lash him
with ridicule or be forced to shoot him. But his rage carried him as far
as the wireless room. He could hear the smack of the spark, but that was
all. He tried the door--locked. He tried the shutters--latched.
Cunningham's man was either calling or answering somebody. Ten minutes
inside that room and there would be another tale to tell.