“That is exactly what they are about to do, Captain. They are going to look round for the unknown ship which has been sending them false messages by marconigram. Watch with me and you may follow the story. That is the first chapter of it.”
I pointed to the deck of the great ship, whence the figure of my little Joan had disappeared as mysteriously as it came; and there I showed to Larry a group of men in earnest talk with a newcomer from the steamer which now lay almost alongside the larger vessel. The quick movements, the gestures of this company betrayed the curiosity which the stranger’s words awakened and the astonishment that rightly followed upon it. Imagining myself to be a spy among them, I heard, in imagination, every word of that fateful conversation. “We sent no message.” “You’ve been fooled right enough.” “There’s mischief afloat.” “No, we had no accident—what in thunder are you talking about?—it’s a lie.” So the new hand must be telling the astonished crew. It needed no great prescience to say what would follow after. Even Timothy McShanus arrived at it before I had finished.
“Would that be Colin Ross gone aboard?” he asked me, wheeling about suddenly.
I told him it would hardly be another.
“Then he’ll tell ’em the truth about the cables, or I’m a liar.”
“He will tell them the truth about the cables, and you are not a liar, Timothy. He is doing so at this very moment.”
“Faith, man, they’ll be firing shots at us then.”
“It is possible, Timothy. If you are curious on the point——”
“Curious be d——d. Would ye have me in the sea?”
“In the sea or out, I would have you keep a cool head, Timothy. They are going to fire at us, but that is not to say that they are going to hit us. Our turn comes after. Neither to-day nor to-morrow may see the end of it. I am only beginning with them, Timothy. When I have done, God help some of them, the Jew above the others. Now wait for it and see. Here’s the lantern busy. They are putting the story to the proof, you will observe. Let us hope that their astonishment may not be too much for them.”