The clerk grinned knowingly. Men grow callous when money tilts the scale against human lives.
"There's no news of the Andromeda, and her rate is all right," he said.
David scowled at him.
"D—n the rate!" he cried. "I want to 'ear of the ship. Wot the——"
But his subordinate vanished. David read a few more letters. Some were from the families of such of the Andromeda's crew as lived in South Shields, the Hartlepools, Whitby. They asked as a great favor that a telegram might be sent when——
"Oh, curse my luck!" groaned the man, quivering under the conviction that the Andromeda was lost "by the act of God" as the charter-party puts it. The belief unnerved him. Those words have an ominous ring in the ears of evil-doers. He could show a bold front to his fellowmen, but he squirmed under the dread conception of a supernatural vengeance. So, like every other malefactor, David railed against his "luck." Little did he guess the extraordinary turn that his "luck" was about to take.
The office boy announced a visitor, evidently not the terrible Bulmer, since he said:
"Gennelman to see yer, sir."
"Oo is it?" growled the shipowner.
"Gennelman from the noospaper, sir."