There are some men whom it is impossible to deal with as gentlemen, just as there are some men whom it is impossible to fight with according to the rules of the prize ring. Schumer was one of them.
Floyd thought the matter over for a moment, and came to the conclusion that Cardon was right. "I have no right to criticize your plan," he answered, "since I haven't any plan of my own to offer instead of it. We'll leave it at that, and trust to luck, and if it comes to doing what you say, I will, of course, back you, unless I hit on any idea between this and to-morrow."
He went on deck. The Southern Cross, carrying every stitch of her canvas, was making a good ten knots, and the foam in her wake had a phosphorescence as though she were leaving behind her a cloud of luminous smoke that clung to the water and refused to rise. Never had he seen the stars more wonderful, or a night more lovely. There was little of the heaviness and languor of the tropics; and but for Canopus and the Cross blazing overhead it might have been a night of June in northern latitudes.
Floyd stood by the fellow at the wheel for a little while, and then he walked forward, and, leaning against the lee rail, looked over the sea. From the fo'c'sle came the sound of a concertina, faint and indistinct; that and the creak of cordage and the slashing of the bow wash were the only sounds in all that infinity of night and silence.
He was thinking of Isbel and the island invisible, but surely there beyond the rim of the sea. There were moments when the whole thing seemed a fantastic dream—Schumer, and the pearls, and the island, and the woman he loved. Was it possible that he would see her on the morrow?
CHAPTER XXXI
THE ISLAND
Next morning early, Floyd was on deck and aloft with a glass. He knew it was impossible, at their rate of sailing, that the island could show up before noon. They might not even sight it before sundown. Yet, all the same, he was on the lookout. There was nothing; nothing but the great wheel of the sea. Not even a gull showed in the whole of that blue expanse.
He came down, disappointed, and was gloomy and absent-minded at breakfast, though Cardon was cheerful enough.