"Oh, I just picked it up," Dennis laughed. "But if you're in a hurry to reach Unalaska, I should think you'd trim sail a bit."
"Orders were to keep her as she is," said Leman curtly, and turned away.
Dennis shrugged his shoulders. It was none of his business how the ship was run, and if Pontifex had reasons for not hurrying, well and good.
Meantime, the silent and motionless Miles Hathaway sat in the cabin, puffing sometimes at the pipe Florence filled for him, watching her as she worked, with unmoving terrible eyes. Tom helped her take care of him, and always it seemed to Dennis that Hathaway was mutely struggling to express something. Once Dennis got out a chart and attempted to locate the wreck.
"Watch my finger, Captain Hathaway," he directed. "If I get 'warm', as the kids used to say, open your mouth."
The effort was fruitless, for although Dennis traced his fingers over the entire line of the Aleuts, Miles Hathaway remained unmoving. In the end, Dennis began to think that the man either did not understand, or possessed a brain as dead as his body. At times, too, the paralytic was almost unable to open his mouth or to swallow. His lips had no independent motion. To communicate with him seemed impossible.
It was the third evening following the meeting in the cabin. Tom and Florence had put Hathaway to bed, and after bidding the skipper and his wife good night, went on deck for a breath of air. Mendez had the deck. Wishing to avoid the black mate, Florence led the way forward to the lee of the brick try-works. There Tom Dennis lighted his pipe, and for a little they sat together in silence, under the strangely soothing yet invigorating influence of the slapping sails and the rushing foam-crested rollers that roared under the lee-rail.
Suddenly a figure appeared coming from aft, preceded by a whimpering sniffle. It was Jerry, the moon-faced cabin boy and he was blubbering away with the subdued racking sobs of a boy.
"Hello, Jerry!" said Dennis. "What's the trouble?"
Jerry peered at them and rubbed his eyes,