“What do I care what it costs?” smiled Mary Tobin. “ ’Tis more real pleasure than I have got out of anything since we said good-bye to the flat on the West Side. From what Teresa tells me, this man of hers is the finest one that ever trod the green earth. Here’s a woman that said the same when Jerry Tobin was courting her.”
“ ’Tis worth something to have you blarney me like that,” said Jerry, whose harsh face could soften with tenderness. “Well, we are young but once, Mary girl, and when we’re young we want what we want when we want it. So I will get that gasoline yacht away from here in a couple of days if I have to shanghai Captain Ed Truscoe.”
Thus it happened that Teresa Fernandez was whisked away to sea with no say in the matter beyond the affectionate gratitude that welled from the depths of her heart. The gasoline cruiser was small for an offshore voyage, but Teresa was too seasoned a sailor to mind the long Pacific swell. Captain Truscoe, veteran towboat man, was unperturbed in anything that would stay afloat and kick a screw over. He was a thick-set, bow-legged chunk of a man, hard and brown, who seldom smiled, and talked with an effort. Teresa perplexed him. At table together in the little cabin, with a Japanese steward dodging about like a juggler, Captain Truscoe stared and pondered. Now and then he bit off a brief question or two.
“What about this uncle? Who let him loose?”
“He ran away from home like a naughty boy and I must coax him back,” replied the amused Teresa.
“Better had. They tuck ’em in padded cells for less. Jerry mentioned a young man, master of the ship. What about him?”
“I am sure I don’t know why he went away on this crazy trip, Captain Truscoe. That is one thing I must find out. It is all very much mixed up.”
“Sounds so. None of my business, I suppose. Known Jerry and his wife long?”
“Not very. They were wonderfully good to me.”
“They like you, Miss Fernandez. Jerry told me to keep on going if I missed your people at Cocos Island. The limit is off, says he.”