"Champagne. If ever all the truth comes out, I fancy it will transpire
that Liane's getting a rake-off from some vintner. You see, Friend
Employer was displaying a cultivated taste in vintage champagnes, but
he'd been culpably negligent in not laying down a large stock for
private consumption before the Great Drought set in. The Delorme found
that out, then that his ancestral acres bordered on Long Island Sound,
and finally that the Sybarite was loafing its head off. What could be
more simple, she suggested, than that monsieur should ballast his
private yacht with champagne on the homeward voyage, make his landfall
some night in the dark of the moon, and put the stuff ashore on his own
property before morning. Did he fall for it? Well, I just guess he
did!"
"This is all most interesting, monsieur, but...." "Where do Monk and I
come in? Oh, like master, like men. Liane was too wise to crab her act
by proposing anything really wicked to the Owner, and wise enough to
know nothing could shock the skipper. And I was wise enough not to let
him get away with anything unless I sat in on the deal.
"Mademoiselle played all her cards face upwards with us. She and de
Lorgnes, she said, were losing money by disposing of their loot this
side, especially with European currency at its present stage of
depreciation. And so long as the owner was doing a little dirty work,
why shouldn't we get together and do something for ourselves on the
side? If champagne could be so easily smuggled into the States, why not
diamonds? We formed a joint-stock company on the spot."
"And made your first coup at the Château de Montalais!"
"Not the first, but the biggest. De Lorgnes' mouth had been watering
for the Montalais stuff for a long time, it seems. My boss had private
business of a nature we won't enter into, in London, and gave me a week
off and the use of his car. We made up the party, toured down the Rhone
valley, and then back by way of the Cévennes, just to get the lay of
the land. I don't think there can be much more you need to know."
"Monsieur is too modest."
"Oh, about me? Why, I guess I'm not an uncommon phenomenon of the
times. I was a good citizen before the War, law-abiding and everything.
If you'd told me then I'd be in this galley to-day, I'd probably have
knocked you for a goal. I had a flourishing young business of my own
and was engaged to be married... When I got back from hell over here, I
found my girl married to another man, my business wrecked, what was
left of it crippled by extortionate taxation to support a government
that was wasting money like a drunken sailor and too cynical to keep
its solemn promises to the men who had fought for it. I had to take a
job as secretary to a man I couldn't respect, and now... Well, if I can
get a bit of my own back by defrauding the government or classing
myself with the unorganised leeches on Society, nothing I know is going
to stop my doing it!"
Phinuit knocked the ashes out of a cold pipe at which he had been
sucking for some time, rose, and stretched.
"The worst of it is," he said in a serious turn--"I mean, looking at
the thing from my bourgeois viewpoint of 1914--the War, but more
particularly the antics of the various governments after the War,
turned out several million of men in my frame of mind the world over.
We went into the thing deluded by patriotic bunk and the promise that
it was a war to end war; we came out to find the old men more firmly
entrenched in the seats of the mighty than ever and stubbornly bent on
perpetuating precisely the same rotten conditions that make wars
inevitable. What Germany did to the treaty that guaranteed Belgium's
neutrality was child's-play compared to what the governments of the
warring nations have done to their covenants with their own people. And
if anybody should ask you, you can safely promise them that several
million soreheads like myself are what the politicians call 'a menace
to the established social order'."
Clear daylight filled the ports. The traffic on deck nearly deserved
the name of din. Commands and calls were being bawled in English,
French, and polyglot profanity. A donkey-engine was rumbling, a winch
clattering, a capstan-pawl clanking. Alongside a tug was panting
hoarsely. The engine room telegraph jangled furiously, the fabric of
the Sybarite shuddered and gathered way.
"We're off," yawned Phinuit. "Now will you be reasonable and go to
bed?"
"You may, monsieur," said Lanyard, getting up. "For my part, I shall go
on deck, if you don't mind, and stop there till the pilot leaves us."
"Fair enough!"
"But one moment more. You have been extraordinarily frank, but you have
forgotten one element, to me of some importance: you have not told me
what my part is in this insane adventure."
"That's not my business to tell you," Phinuit replied promptly. "When
anything as important as that comes out, it won't be through my
babbling. Anyhow, Liane may have changed her mind since last reports.
And so, as far as I'm concerned, your present status is simply that of
her pet protégé. What it is to be hereafter you'll learn from her, I
suppose, soon enough.... Le's go!"
XXII
OUT OF SOUNDINGS
When finally Lanyard did consent to seek his stateroom--with the pilot
dropped and the Sybarite footing it featly over Channel waters to airs
piped by a freshening breeze--it was to sleep once round the clock and
something more; for it was nearly six in the afternoon when he came on
deck again.
The quarterdeck, a place of Epicurean ease for idle passengers, was
deserted but for a couple of deckhands engaged in furling the awning.
Lanyard lounged on the rail, revelling in a sense of perfect physical
refreshment intensified by the gracious motion of the vessel, the
friendly, rhythmic chant of her engines, the sweeping ocean air and the
song it sang in the rigging, the vision of blue seas snow-plumed and
mirroring in a myriad facets the red gold of the westering sun, and the
lift and dip of a far horizon whose banks of violet mist were the
fading shores of France.
In these circumstances of the sea he loved so well there was certain
anodyne for those twinges of chagrin which he must suffer when reminded
of the sorry figure he had cut overnight.
Still there were compensations--of a more material nature, too, than
this delight which he had of being once again at sea. To have cheapened
himself in the estimation of Liane Delorme and Phinuit and Monk was
really to his advantage; for to persuade an adversary to under-estimate
one is to make him almost an ally. Also, Lanyard now had no more need
to question the fate of the Montalais jewels, no more blank spaces
remained to be filled in his hypothetical explanation of the intrigues
which had enmeshed the Château de Montalais, its lady and his honour.
He knew now all he needed to know, he could put his hand on the jewels
when he would; and he had a fair fortnight (the probable duration of
their voyage, according to Monk) in which to revolve plans for making
away with them at minimum cost to himself in exertion and exposure to
reprisals.
Plans? He had none as yet, he would begin to formulate and ponder them
only when he had better acquaintance with the ship and her company and
had learned more about that ambiguous landfall which she was to make
(as Phinuit had put it) "in the dark of the moon."
Not that he made the mistake of despising those two social malcontents,
Phinuit and Jules, that rogue adventurer Monk, that grasping courtesan
Liane Delorme.
Individually and collectively Lanyard accounted that quartet uncommonly
clever, resourceful, audacious, unscrupulous, and potentially ruthless,
utterly callous to compunctions when their interests were jeopardised.
But it was inconceivable that he should fail to outwit and frustrate
them, who had the love and faith of Eve de Montalais to honour,
cherish, and requite.
Growing insight into the idiosyncrasies of the men left him undismayed.
He perceived the steel of inflexible purpose beneath the windy egotism
of Phinuit. The pompous histrionism of Monk, he knew, was merely a
shell for the cold, calculating, undeviating selfishness that too
frequently comes with advancing years. Nevertheless these two were
factors whose functionings might be predicted.
It was Liane Delorme who provided the erratic equation. Her woman's
mind was not only the directing intelligence, it was as eccentric as
quicksilver, infinitely supple and corrupt, Oriental in its
trickishness and impenetrability. Already it had conceived some project
involving him which he could by no means divine or even guess at
without a sense of wasting time.
Trying to put himself in her place, Lanyard believed that he would
never have neglected the opportunity that, so far as she knew, had been
hers, to steal away from Paris while he slept and leave an enemy in his
way quite as dangerous as "Dupont" to gnaw his nails in the
mortification of defeat. Why she had not done so, why she had permitted
Monk and Phinuit to play their comedy of offering him the jewels,
passed understanding.
But of one thing Lanyard felt reasonably assured: now that she had him
to all intents and purposes her foiled and harmless captive aboard the
Sybarite, Liane would not keep him waiting long for enlightenment as to
her intentions.
He had to wait, however, that night and the next three before the woman
showed herself. She was reported ill with mal-de-mer. Lanyard thought
it quite likely that she was; before she was out of the Channel the
Sybarite was contesting a moderate gale from the Southwest. On the
other hand, he imagined that Liane might sensibly be making seasickness
an excuse to get thoroughly rested and settled in her mind as to her
course with him.
So he schooled himself to be patient, and put in his time to good
profit taking the measures of his shipmates and learning his way about
ship.
The Sybarite seemed unnecessarily large for a pleasure boat. Captain
Monk had designated her a ship of nine hundred tons. Certainly she had
room and to spare on deck as well as below for the accommodation of
many guests in addition to the crew of thirty required for her
navigation and their comfort. A good all-weather boat, very steady in a
seaway, her lines were nevertheless fine, nothing in her appearance in
the least suggested a vessel of commercial character--"all yacht" was
what Monk called her.
The first mate, a Mr. Swain, was a sturdy Britisher with a very red
face and cool blue eyes, not easily impressed; if Lanyard were not in
error, Mr. Swain entertained a private opinion of the lot of them,
Captain Monk included, decidedly uncomplimentary. But he was a civil
sort, though deficient in sense of humour and inclined to be a bit
abrupt in a preoccupied fashion.
Mr. Collison, the second mate, was another kind entirely, an American
with the drawl of the South in his voice, a dark, slender man with eyes
quick and shrewd. His manners were excellent, his reserve notable,
though he seemed to derive considerable amusement from what he saw of
the passengers, going on his habit of indulging quiet smiles as he
listened to their communications. He talked very little and played an
excellent game of poker.
The chief engineer was a Mr. Mussey, stout, affable, and cynic, a heavy
drinker, untidy about his person and exacting about his engine-room, a
veteran of his trade and--it was said--an ancient croney of Monk's.
There was, at all events, a complete understanding evident between
these two, though now and again, especially at table, when Monk was
putting on something more than his customary amount of side, Lanyard
would observe Mussey's eyes fixed in contemplation upon his superior
officer, with a look in them that wanted reading. He was nobody's fool,
certainly not Monk's, and at such times Lanyard would have given more
than a penny for Mussey's thoughts.
Existing in daily contact, more or less close, with these gentlemen,
observing them as they went to and fro upon their lawful occasions,
Lanyard often speculated as to their attitude toward this lawless
errand of the Sybarite's, of which they could hardly be unsuspicious
even if they were not intimate with its true nature. And remembering
what penalties attach to apprehension in the act of smuggling, even
though it be only a few cases of champagne, he thought it a wild risk
for them to run for the sake of their daily wage.
Something to this effect he intimated to Phinuit.
"Don't worry about this lot," that one replied. "They're wise birds,
tough as they make 'em, ready for anything; hand-picked down to the
last coal-passer. The skipper isn't a man to take fool chances, and
when he recruited this crew, he took nobody he couldn't answer for.
They're more than well paid, and they'll do as they're told and keep
their traps as tight as clams'."
"But, I take it, they were signed on before this present voyage was
thought of; while you seem to imply that Captain Monk anticipated
having to depend upon these good fellows in unlawful enterprises."
"Maybe he did, at that," Phinuit promptly surmised, with a bland eye.
"I wouldn't put it past him. The skipper's deep, and I'll never tell
you what he had in the back of his mind when he let Friend Boss
persuade him to take command of a pleasure yacht. Because I don't know.
If it comes to that, the owner himself never confided in me just what
the large idea was in buying this ark for a plaything. Yachting for fun
is one thing; running a young floating hotel is something else again."
"Then you don't believe the grandiose illusions due to sudden wealth
were alone responsible?"
"I don't know. That little man has a mind of his own, and even if I do
figure on his payroll as confidential secretary, he doesn't tell me
everything he knows."
"Still," said Lanyard drily, "one cannot think you can complain that he
has hesitated to repose his trust in you."
To this Phinuit made no reply other than a non-committal grunt; and
presently Lanyard added:
"It is hardly possible--eh?--that the officers and crew know nothing of
what is intended with all the champagne you have recently taken
aboard."
"They're no fools. They know there's enough of the stuff on board to do
a Cunarder for the next ten years, and they know, too, there's no
lawful way of getting it into the States."
"So, then! They know that. How much more may they not know?"
Phinuit turned a startled face to him. "What's that?" he demanded
sharply.
"May they not have exercised their wits as well on the subject of your
secret project, my friend?"
"What are you getting at?"
"One is wondering what these 'wise birds, as tough as they make them'
would do if they thought you were--as you say--getting away with
something at their expense as well as the owner's."
"What have you seen or heard?"
"Positively nothing. This is merely idle speculation."
"Well!" Phinuit sighed sibilantly and relaxed. "Let's hope they never
find out."
By dawn of the fourth day the gale had spent its greatest strength;
what was left of it subsided steadily till, as the seafaring phrase has
it, the wind went down with the sun. Calm ensued. Lanyard woke up the
next morning to view from his stateroom deadlights vistas illimitable
of flat blue flawed by hardly a wrinkle; only by watching the horizon
was one aware of the slow swell of the sea, its sole perceptible
motion. And all day long the Sybarite trudged on an even keel with only
the wind of her way to flutter the gay awnings of the quarterdeck,
while the waters sheared by her stem ran down her sides hissing
resentment of this violation of their absolute tranquillity.
Also, the sun made itself felt, electric fans buzzed everywhere, and
perspiring in utter indolence beneath the awnings, one thought in
sympathy of those damned souls below, in the hell of the stoke-hole.
At luncheon Liane Delorme appeared in a summery toilette that would
have made its mark on the beach of Deauville.
Voluntary or enforced, her period of retreat had done her good. Making
every allowance for the aid of art, the woman looked years younger than
when Lanyard had last seen her. Nobody would ever have believed her a
day older than twenty-five, no one, that is to say, who had not watched
youth ebb from her face and leave it grey and waste with premature
winter, as Lanyard had that morning when he told her of the death of de
Lorgnes in the restaurant of the Buttes Montmartre.
Liane herself had long since put quite out of mind that mauvais quart
d'heure. Her present serenity was as flawless as the sea's, though,
unlike the sea, she sparkled. She was as gay as any school-girl--though
any school-girl guilty, or even capable, of a scintilla of the amusing
impropriety of her badinage would have merited and won instant
expulsion.
She inaugurated without any delay a campaign of conquest extremely
diverting to observe. To Lanyard it seemed that her methods were crude
and obvious enough; but it did something toward mitigating the
long-drawn boredom of the cruise to watch them work out, as they seemed
to invariably, with entire success; and then remark the insouciance
with which, another raw scalp dangling from her belt, Liane would
address herself to the next victim.
Mr. Swain was the first to fall, mainly because he happened to be
present at luncheon, it being Mr. Collison's watch on the bridge. Under
the warmth of violet eyes which sought his constantly, drawn by what
one was left to infer was an irresistible attraction, his reserve
melted rapidly, his remote blue stare grew infinitely less distant; and
though he blushed furiously at some of the more audacious of Liane's
sallies, he was quick to take his cue when she expressed curiosity
concerning the duties of the officer of the watch. And coming up at
about two bells for a turn round the deck and a few breaths of fresh
air before dressing for dinner, Lanyard saw them on the bridge, their
heads together over the binnacle--to the open disgust of the man at the
wheel.
Liane hailed him, with vivacious gestures commanded his attendance. As
a brother in good standing, one could hardly do less than humour her
gracefully; so Lanyard trotted up to the companion ladder, and Liane,
resting a hand of sisterly affection upon his arm, besought him to make
clear to her feminine stupidity Swain's hopelessly technical
explanation of the compass and binnacle.
Obligingly Mr. Swain repeated his lecture, and Lanyard, learning for
himself with considerable surprise what a highly complicated instrument
of precision is the modern compass, and that the binnacle has essential
functions entirely aside from supporting the compass and housing it
from the weather, could hardly blame his sister for being confused.
Indeed, he grew so interested in Swain's exposition of deviation and
variation and magnetic attraction and the various devices employed to
counteract these influences, the Flinders bars, the soft-iron spheres,
and the system of adjustable magnets located in the pedestal of the
binnacle, that he had to be reminded by a mild exhibition of sisterly
temper that she hadn't summoned him to the bridge for his private
edification.
"So then!" he said after due show of contrition--"it is like this: the
magnetic needle is susceptible to many attractions aside from that of
the pole; it is influenced by juxtaposition to other pieces or masses
of magnetized metal. The iron ship itself, for example, is one great
magnet. Then there are dissociated masses of iron within the ship, each
possessing an individual power of magnetism sufficient to drag the
needle far from its normal fidelity to the pole. So the scientific
mariner, when he installs a compass on board his ship, measures these
several forces, their influence upon the needle, and installs others to
correct them--on the principle of like cures like.
"Let us put it in a figure: The compass is the husband, the pole the
wife. Now it is well known that husbands are for all that human beings,
able to perceive attractions in persons other than those to whom they
are married. The wise wife, then, studies the charms of mind or person
which in others appeal to her husband, and makes them her own; or if
that is impossible cultivates other qualities quite as potent to
distract him. It results from this, that the wise wife becomes, as they
say 'all women to one man.' Now here the binnacle represents the arts
by which that wise wife, the pole, keeps her husband true by
surrounding him with charms and qualities--these magnets--sufficiently
powerful to counteract the attractions of others. Do I make myself
clear?"
"But perfectly!" Liane nodded emphatically. "What a mind to have in the
family!" she appealed to Mr. Swain. "Do you know, monsieur, it happens
often to me to wonder how I should have so clever a brother?"
"It is like that with me, too," Lanyard insisted warmly.
He made an early excuse to get away, having something new to think
about.
Mr. Mussey put up a stiffer fight than Mr. Swain, since an avowed cynic
is necessarily a Man Who Knows About Women. He gave Liane flatly to
understand that he saw through her and couldn't be taken in by all her
blandishments. At the end of twenty-four hours, however, the conviction
seemed somehow to have insidiously penetrated that only a man of his
ripe wisdom and disillusionment could possibly have any appeal to a
woman like Liane Delorme. It wasn't long after that the engine room was
illuminated by Liane's pretty ankles and Mr. Mussey was beginning to
comprehend that there was in this world one woman at least who could
take an intelligent interest in machinery.
Mr. Collison succumbed without a struggle. True to the tradition of
Southern chivalry, he ambled up to the block, laid his head upon it,
and asked for the axe. Nor was he kept long waiting...
On the seventh day the course pricked on the chart placed the
Sybarite's position at noon as approximately in mid-Atlantic.
Contemplating a prospect of seven days more of such emptiness,
Lanyard's very soul yawned.
And nothing could induce Captain Monk to hasten the passage. Mr. Mussey
asserted that his engines could at a pinch deliver twenty knots an
hour; yet day in and day out the Sybarite poked along at little better
than half that speed. It was no secret that Liane Delorme's panic
flight from Popinot had hurried the yacht out of Cherbourg harbour four
days earlier than her proposed sailing date, whereas the Sybarite had a
rendezvous to keep with her owner at a certain hour of a certain night,
an appointment carefully calculated with consideration for the phase of
the moon and the height of the tide, therefore not readily to be
altered.
After dinner on that seventh day, a meal much too long drawn out for
Lanyard's liking, and marked to boot by the consumption of much too
much champagne, he left the main saloon the arena of an impromptu poker
party, repaired to the quarterdeck, and finding a wicker lounge chair
by the taffrail subsided into it with a sigh of gratitude for this
fragrant solitude of night, so soothing and serene.