“I think the whole affair is a nightmare—I mean this trip,” she declared. “I don’t believe the good Lord is going to allow a man like Marcena Keedy to succeed in any decent enterprise.”
I rubbed my ear and looked at her for a few minutes. I had been turning over a thought about this expedition in my mind for some days. I did not know whether to say anything to her about it or not. It would be giving Captain Holstrom a pretty hard dig. But I blurted it, for she knew I had something on my mind and bluntly demanded to know what I was thinking about.
“Perhaps this is the kind of a scheme where the devil will help his own, Miss Holstrom—and therefore Keedy belongs in the thick of it as chief manager. He’ll win on that basis. I don’t know much about admiralty law or maritime justice. But it may be that this treasure has not been officially abandoned. Perhaps taking it is stealing it. I know that the Zizania got away from port with papers as a trawl fisher. I know I have no business talking like this about your father’s affair. But if it’s to be real stealing, perhaps we’ll succeed with Keedy in the game,” I said—and it was a pretty clumsy joke. It fell flat.
“I hope my father will wake up,” she said, curtly, looking down on him where he was giving off orders about clearing the big derrick. “Sometimes I almost believe in evil spirits and in control of a man’s mind by another man—in a wicked way, I mean. But I thank God there’s one of the Holstrom family who can’t be hypnotized by Marcena Keedy. That is why I have come on this voyage—my father needs a guardian.”
She came down the steps from the wheel-house, and went into her state-room. I walked aft, for the Zizania had swung with the surges, and was tailing toward shore, and I wanted to look at the place where my work had been cut out for me.
Keedy met me amidship. He came out from behind a lashed life-boat, and it struck me at once that he had been in ambush, spying on me. That was before he had opened his mouth. He did not leave me in any doubt when he began to talk.
“Let’s get to an understanding about Miss Holstrom, Sidney,” he rasped, leveling his finger at me. “You let her alone. No more buzzing her behind my back or her father’s.”
“Keedy, you have started running after trouble to-day. In my case, you’ll catch up with it mighty soon.”
“Then let’s make believe I have caught up. I’m going to marry that young lady. And no cheap Yankee masher is going to stand around and make sheep’s eyes at her. That’s business and you keep your hands down. You slap me again, Sidney, and I’ll drop you in your tracks—even if the gold stays there till we can get another diver.” He had his hand on his hip, and his eyes were fairly green.
I started to tell him what I thought of him and his chances with that girl, proposing to throw in a few remarks about what I should do if I wanted to. But I shut my mouth suddenly. I had no right to stand out there and insult a girl by quarreling about her with a fellow of that stripe.