This graphic description of my Oxford blazer was so striking that in spite of the seriousness of the case I did the one thing I should not have done,—I laughed. The laugh was like a spark to a powder-mine, and what made the crisis worse was that the old gentleman in his armchair on deck, hearing the shrieking voice, came down, his face haggard with anxiety.
“Gertie, Gertie!” he cried. I would not like to say the young lady swore, but she came so near it that there was but tissue paper between the expression she used and that which an angry fish-wife would have employed. With the quickness of light she sprang at a large Japanese vase which temporarily decorated the center of the table. This she heaved up, and with the skill of a football player flung it squarely at me. Now, I have had some experience on the football field myself, and I caught that vase with a dexterity which would have evoked applause had any enthusiast of the game happened to be present. I suppose my placing of this huge vase on the top of the piano was the last straw, or perhaps it was her father coming forward, crying in a grief-shaken voice, “Oh, Gertie, Gertie, my child, my child!”
I was so sorry for him that I passed him and would have gone on deck out of the way, but my purpose was checked by a startling incident. The young woman had whisked open a drawer. I heard it come clattering to the floor, for she had jerked it clear from its place; then there was a scream. Turning quickly around I met the blinding flash of a pistol, and heard behind me the crash of a splintering mirror. The sound of the revolver in that contracted space was deafening, and even through the smoke I saw that my young friend was about to fire again. I maintain it was not fear for my own life that caused instant action on my part, but this infuriated creature, who seemed to have become insane in her anger, faced three helpless, unarmed people, and whatever was to be done had to be done quickly. I leaped through the air, and grasped her two wrists with an energetic clutch I daresay she had never encountered before.
“Drop that revolver!” I cried.
“Let go my wrists, you beast,” she hissed in my face. For answer I raised her arms and brought them down with a force that would have broken her fingers with the weight of the revolver if she had not let it go clattering to the floor.
“You beast, you beast, you beast!” she shrieked at me, as well as her choking throat would allow utterance. I swung her around a quarter-circle, then pushed her back, somewhat rudely I fear, until she sank down into a chair.
“Now, sit there and cool,” I cried, giving her a hearty shake, so that she should know how it felt herself. “If you don’t keep quiet I’ll box your ears.”
I don’t defend my action at all; I merely state that I was just as angry as she was, and perhaps a little more so.
“You brute, let go of my wrists! I’ll kill you for this! Hilda, call the captain and have this man put in irons. Father, how can you stand there like a coward and see a beastly ruffian use me in this way?”
“Oh, Gertie, Gertie!” repeated the father without moving.