"Please don't, anybody, tell about the Quakeress to-night!"
XIV
THE COMMITTEE OF SEVEN
"Hitherto," said the senator, in his stateroom, to the bishop and the judge, "there really has been no need to take any assertive step."
He was explaining his slowness as head of the deputation and was glad, he said, to have a word apart with these two. The room could not seat seven and for the moment the other four were at the bar, where standing was so much easier than elsewhere.
Their business, the seven's, he added, was with the captain, and officially the captain had gone off duty at eight o'clock and was on again only now, at midnight, in the "middle watch." Even yet there need be no hurry; what they wanted done could not be done before early morning, at Prophet's Island.
The bishop approved. "Don't cross the bridge till you get to it," he quoted.
The judge—whose elderly maiden sister was aboard and abed but awake and alarmed and amazed and astounded that he should be so helpless—assented, too, but thought there was now no call for further delay; Prophet's Island was nearer every moment and the sooner "those people" were well ashore the safer—and easier—for everybody.
"I was giving our numbers time to grow," remarked the senator.