After a time the Arrowsic’s corkscrew motion ceased. She lifted and dipped with the long and slow rollers offshore. In this easier sea the sponson boat would be bringing to Captain Bent’s presence that stubborn barnacle pried loose from a lawless quarterdeck!
Captain Bent scuffled together the cards and dropped them into a drawer of the table. The cutter had been riding for some minutes, engine stilled, waiting for rowers to overhaul her.
The commander sat straight in his swivel chair, crossed his arms on his breast, allowed his visage to congeal.
In due course of time he heard Todd’s unmistakable rat-te-tat on the door admitting from the ward room. Ah, reflected the chief, Mr. Todd knew what was what in the code of handling visitors! He was not granting to this rum skipper the courtesy of the companionway, allowing the pirate to profane the cutter’s quarter-deck.
When Captain Bent barked permission, the executive officer quickly opened the door and as quickly slammed it shut, allowing himself scant time for pushing in the man he had brought.
The cutter commander leaped to his feet, his jaw sagging with the effect of a sardonic grin, saying no word. He had no desire to speak. Nothing sensible in the way of talk at this moment occurred to him. How does one talk to a ghost? Or to a mentor disgraced? Or to an idol in the dust?
If this were truly a being of flesh and blood, this person who leaned against the closed door, the man was Captain York Coombs, once lord of the quarter-deck of the good ship Harvest Home. But because the man was saying nothing he persisted in his semblance of a phantom, if phantoms are able to “oil up”—a mariner phrase for rigging oneself in rubber boots, slicker and sou’wester.
Captain Bent’s recognition flashed to the conviction that this was Captain York Coombs, still alive, despite reports that he had died. On him was the print of the years between prime and old age.
But Captain Coombs was staring in his turn, without showing a sign of recognition. A lad had grown into a man whose rugged experiences had altered his aspect out of all semblance to the apprentice aboard the Harvest Home.
At once, memory working fast after the first surprise, the fact that Captain Coombs was saying nothing identified him more completely for the other’s comprehension.