“Why?” I asked.
He returned my look with one searching and eager; then:
“If I show you the reason,” said he, “and trust you with all my papers,
will you go down to the dock--it's no great distance--and ask to see
Marryat, the chief officer? Perhaps you've sailed with him?”
“No,” I replied guardedly. “I was never in the Patna.”
“Never mind. When you give him a letter which I shall write he will make
the necessary arrangements for me to occupy my state-room to-night. I
knew him well,” he explained, “in--the old days. Will you do it, Jim?”
“I'll do it with pleasure,” I answered.
“Shake!” said Captain Dan.
We shook hands heartily, and:
“Now I'll show you the reason,” he added. “Come upstairs.”
Turning, he led the way upstairs to his own room, and wondering greatly,
I followed him in. Never having been in Captain Dan's apartments I
cannot say whether they, like their occupant, had changed for the
better. But I found myself in a room surprisingly clean and with a note
of culture in its appointments which was even more surprising.
On a couch by the window, wrapped in a fur rug, lay the prettiest
half-caste girl I had ever seen, East or West. Her skin was like cream
rose petals and her abundant hair was of wonderful lustrous black.
Perhaps it was her smooth warm colour which suggested the idea, but
as her cheeks flushed at sight of Captain Dan and the long dark eyes
lighted up in welcome, I thought of a delicate painting on ivory and I
wondered more and more what it all could mean.
“I have brought Jim to see you,” said Captain Dan. “No, don't trouble to
move dear.”
But even before he had spoken I had seen the girl wince with pain as she
had endeavoured to sit up to greet us. She lay on her side in a rather
constrained attitude, but although her sudden movement had brought tears
to her eyes she smiled bravely and extended a tiny ivory hand to me.
“This is my wife, Jim!” said Captain Dan.
I could find no words at all, but merely stood there looking very
awkward and feeling almost awed by the indescribable expression of trust
in the eyes of the little Eurasian, as with her tiny fingers hidden in
her husband's clasp she lay looking up at him.
“Now you know, Jim,” said he, “why we must get aboard the Patna
to-night. My wife is really too ill to travel; in fact, I shall have
to carry her down to the cab, and such a proceeding in daylight would
attract an enormous crowd in this neighbourhood!”
“Give me the letters and the papers,” I answered. “I will start now.”
His wife disengaged her hand and extended it to me.
“Thank you,” she said, in a queer little silver-bell voice; “you are
good. I shall always love you.”