Even while he bent reverently over the unlucky Chilean’s body, the deafening vibration of the fog-horn ceased, and he heard Elsie’s glad cry from the saloon:
“Oh my, here comes Joey! That means that Captain Courtenay has left the bridge.”
The girl’s joyous exclamation, her prelude to a paean of thanks that the dreadful necessary slaying of men had ceased, was a strange commentary on the shattered form stretched at the commander’s feet. Among the small company on board, it had been decreed that one, at least, after surviving so many perils, should never see home and kin again.
He gave orders that the dead man should be carried to the poop to await a sailor’s burial; then he turned, and with less sprightly step descended the main companion. In the saloon he found Elsie and Christobal watching the stairs expectantly. The girl had the dog in her arms, and Courtenay perceived, for the first time, that Joey’s off fore paw had been cut by the broken glass which littered the floor of the chart-house.
“Then the attack has really failed?” was Elsie’s greeting. “I saw some of the canoes turn and scurry away. That was the first good sign. And then Joey came.”
“You saw them?” repeated Courtenay, his bent brows emphasizing the question.
“Yes. I was looking through one of the ports. Was that wrong?”
“Which one?”
She pointed. “That one,” said she, wondering that he had never a smile for her.
“Then you must obey orders more faithfully next time. A man was shot dead by a stray bullet not three feet above your head.”