"How far do you intend carrying me?"
"To the Farilones, perhaps."
Richard Debney's face had a sick look. "Take me to your cabin," he whispered.
What was said behind the closed door no man in this world knows, and it is well not to listen too closely to those who part, knowing that they will never meet again. They had been children in the one mother's arms; there was nothing in common between them now except that ancient love.
Nearing the Farilones, Captain Debney was put off in an open boat. Standing there alone, he was once more a naval officer, and he called out sternly: "Sir, I hope to sink you and your smuggling craft within four- and-twenty hours!"
Captain Shewell spoke no word, but saluted deliberately, and watched his brother's boat recede, till it was a speck upon the sea, as it moved towards Golden Gate.
"Good old Dick!" he said at last, as he turned away toward the bridge.
"And he'll do it, if he can!"
But he never did, for as the Cormorant cleared the harbour that evening there came an accident to her machinery, and with two days' start the Hornet was on her way to be sold again to a South American Republic.
And Edward Debney, once her captain? What does it matter?