“Whoever you are,” I said in a low tone, “sheer off until daylight, or I will fire.”
The response was an unmistakable sigh of relief, followed by an eager whisper: “Tojin sama—honorable foreigner, only one man come.”
Almost at the first word I knew that my visitor was the younger officer of the guard-boat.
“You come alone?” I demanded. “What for?”
“Make still, honorable foreigner!” he cautioned. “Ometsuke hear.”
“Ometsuke?”
“Watchers—spies.”
“You’ve slipped through the guard-boats on a secret visit!” I whispered, curiosity fast overcoming my caution. “Why do you come?”
“To go in ship, honorable sir,—England, ’Merica, five continents go—no stop. In boat to pay, gold is.”
For a moment astonishment held me mute. Who had ever before heard of a Japanese voluntarily leaving his own shores? Many as had been picked up by whalers and clippers in the neighboring seas, I knew of no instance where the rescued men had not been either wrecked or blown too far out to sea to be able to navigate their miserable junks into a home port. The thought flashed upon me that the man might be a criminal. Only the strongest of motives could have impelled him to seek to break the inflexible law of his country against foreign travel. But the memory of his smiling, high-bred face was against the supposition of guilt.