“‘She’ll never hear that you have been in the dock anyway,’ said Jelland. ‘My people never did much for me, but I will do that much for them. It’s no good, Mac. We can chuck our hands. God bless you, old man! Here’s the pistol!’
“He cocked the revolver, and held the butt towards the youngster. But the other shrunk away from it with little gasps and cries. Jelland glanced at the approaching boat. It was not more than a few hundred yards away.
“‘There’s no time for nonsense,’ said he. ‘Damn it! man, what’s the use of flinching? You swore it!’
“‘No, no, Jelland!’
“‘Well, anyhow, I swore that neither of us should be taken. Will you do it?’
“‘I can’t! I can’t!’
“‘Then I will for you.’
“The rowers in the boat saw him lean forwards, they heard two pistol shots, they saw him double himself across the tiller, and then, before the smoke had lifted, they found that they had something else to think of.
“For at that instant the storm broke—one of those short sudden squalls which are common in these seas. The Matilda heeled over, her sails bellied out, she plunged her lee-rail into a wave, and was off like a frightened deer. Jelland’s body had jammed the helm, and she kept a course right before the wind, and fluttered away over the rising sea like a blown piece of paper. The rowers worked frantically, but the yawl still drew ahead, and in five minutes it had plunged into the storm wrack never to be seen again by mortal eye. The boat put back, and reached Yokohama with the water washing half-way up to the thwarts.
“And that was how it came that the yawl Matilda, with a cargo of five thousand pounds and a crew of two dead young men, set sail across the Pacific Ocean. What the end of Jelland’s voyage may have been no man knows. He may have foundered in that gale, or he may have been picked up by some canny merchantman, who stuck to the bullion and kept his mouth shut, or he may still be cruising in that vast waste of waters, blown north to the Behring Sea, or south to the Malay Islands. It’s better to leave it unfinished than to spoil a true story by inventing a tag to it.”