Stretton's face flushed angrily.
"He had no right to tell you. I wished for these few weeks to be alone. He gave me his word he would tell no one."
"He had to break his word," said Warrisden, firmly. "It is necessary that you should come home at once."
Stretton laughed. Warrisden was clinging to a wire stay from the cutter's mizzen-mast, and even so could hardly keep his feet. He had a sense of coming failure from the very ease with which Stretton stood resting his hands upon his hips, unsupported on the unsteady deck.
"I cannot come," said Stretton abruptly; and he turned away. As he turned Warrisden shouted--for in that high wind words carried in no other way--"Your father, Sir John Stretton, is dying."
Stretton stopped. He looked for a time thoughtfully into Warrisden's face; but there was no change in his expression by which Warrisden could gather whether the argument would prevail or no. And when at last he spoke, it was to say--
"But he has not sent for me."
It was the weak point in Warrisden's argument, and Stretton had, in his direct way, come to it at once. Warrisden was silent.
"Well?" asked Stretton. "He has not sent for me?"
"No," Warrisden admitted; "that is true."