“You must not delay on our account. The weather is very fine at last. It would be a pity to lose a chance of a smooth voyage to England. The season——”
“We have no fixed plans. Davies wants to get some shooting.
“My father will be much occupied.”
“We can see you.”
I insisted on being obtuse, for though this fencing with an unstrung girl was hateful work, the quest was at stake. We were going to Norderney, come what might, and sooner or later we must see Dollmann. It was no use promising not to. I had given no pledge to von Brüning, and I would give none to her. The only alternative was to violate the compact (which the present fiasco had surely weakened), speak out, and try and make an ally of her. Against her own father? I shrank from the responsibility and counted the cost of failure—certain failure, to judge by her conduct. She began to hoist her lugsail in a dazed, shiftless fashion, while our two boats drifted slowly to leeward.
“Father might not like it,” she said, so low and from such tremulous lips that I scarcely caught her words. “He does not like foreigners much. I am afraid . . . he did not want to see Herr Davies again.”
“But I thought——”
“It was wrong of me to come aboard—I suddenly remembered; but I could not tell Herr Davies.”
“I see,” I answered. “I will tell him.”
“Yes, that he must not come near us.”