a long mirror. He studied this object with concern. The flight of time, since last he had seen the cardsharper, had wrought many changes in his appearance. He was keener-faced and firmer of mouth. The silver-gray hair at his temples was unnatural and gave him a youthful appearance due to contrast.
“Stavanger,� he said upending the glass and feeling the warmth of the liquor. “I’ll remember that. Few Greeks go to that port. I wonder why he’s going there?�
“Greeks,� in the argot of the underworld, were cardsharpers and sure-thing manipulators. Fay despised their profession. He had an abiding belief that a man had not lost all honor who would take a strong-box or a long chance. There had been no chance in the sharper’s game. The meanest thief in the world, to him, was the professional gambler.
He rose and closed his tweed coat with a quick motion. The ship’s bell had struck two times, spaced close together. It was five o’clock. The Lowland Country must soon appear through the fog.
It came to him, as he stepped to the dark deck, that the one change in the sharper’s make-up was the smoked glasses. They were incongruous and beetle-appearing. They struck a false note in a card game. Fay felt dimly that there was a good reason for wearing them. He sensed a mystery there. He revolved the matter in his mind and searched the deck for the two. They had disappeared into a cabin. Most probably they were dividing the wool shorn from the Yorkshire lamb.
A bo’swain, in sou’wester and oilskins, was heaving the lead from the starboard chains of the foremast standing-rigging. He called the fathoms with monotonous regularity. “By the deep, four,� rolled along the ship. A bell clanged. A jingle sounded. The screw thrashed as the helm was ported. A stumpy man, in smug pea-jacket, came out of the pilot-house, and grasping a funnel stay, leaned far forward. He searched the yellow fog which drifted athwart the bow. He whipped out a pair of twelve-diameter glasses and focused them with his right thumb.
He turned his head, lowered the glasses and pointed toward a green buoy which was passed close to starboard. This buoy bore the number “9� on its side. The wheelman put up the wheel three spokes, then steadied the ship. She groped on with careful searching until a mud spit ran beneath the fog curtain and headed their course.
“Up more,� said the man in the pea-jacket. “Hard up!� he snapped with British vim. “All the way up, you!�
The ship sheered like a frightened sow and lay broadside to the spit. The screw thrashed. They wore around the point and started clamping down a fog-shrouded channel which was lined with green buoys and gas flares.
The scent of fish and lowland marshes came over the water. The clank of a hidden windmill sounded close to port. One gaunt arm pierced through the veil and then was gone. The way ahead opened and revealed a vista of smacks and crude wooden schooners. The