"Go back to your bunk," he said in a low tone. "And not a whisper of what you have seen to a soul. Understand?"
She nodded.
He jerked his head in a manner signifying that she was to go, and the girl crept back to her cabin, feeling very much like a school-boy who has been discovered breaking bounds. What she had thought to be a horrible tragedy had, so far as she was concerned, turned out to be a farce. Yet, with feminine inconsistency, her secret admiration for Calamity was increased a hundredfold. His extraordinary preparedness, his calm, unshakable self-reliance, his independence of everyone else, fascinated her. There was nothing picturesque or heroic in his manner or appearance, yet he had proved himself a match, and more than a match, for the desperadoes who surrounded him. There was not a man on board his equal in resourcefulness, watchfulness, or strength of purpose; he was master of them all.
Even while she felt deeply humiliated at his treatment of her, she realised the absurdity of such a feeling. To him she was of less consequence even than the most inefficient fireman or sailor on board; for all she knew to the contrary, he had, until this brief and unexpected encounter, forgotten her very existence. She felt that to nourish resentment on this account would be childish; a wave might as well nourish resentment against the rock on which it ineffectually dashed itself. For the first time in her life Dora Fletcher had met a man who was as indifferent to her feelings as he was to her sex, and, curiously enough, she was not altogether displeased by this.
Calamity, meanwhile, was playing his own game in his own way. Withdrawing into the shadows, he awaited the return of Skelt from his murderous errand. He had not long to wait. A moment or two after Dora Fletcher had been so curtly ordered back to her cabin, the head of the ex-boatswain appeared over the taffrail. He cast a hurried glance right and left, then cautiously clambered over the rail and lowered himself on to the deck. As he did so a hand shot out from the darkness and clutched his throat with a grip of steel. Not until he was on the verge of being suffocated did the choking grip relax, and then a hand fastened upon his shoulder.
"Silence. Come with me," said a voice which sent a thrill of terror through him.
Skelt had no alternative but to obey, and so, with the Captain's heavy hand still upon his shoulder, accompanied him into the cabin.
"Now," said Calamity as he seated himself and surveyed his prisoner, "be good enough to explain this disobedience to orders."
The fellow looked at him in astonishment. It was disconcerting enough to find himself a prisoner in the hands of the man he had intended to murder, but it was amazing to be accused by him of what sounded like a minor offence.
"I don't understand," he answered sullenly.