The Unwilling Guest came on deck. He seemed weak and somewhat thoughtful. No one had whispered a word to him of the ship that had gone to her grave, but the very force of the storm, the thundering peril of it had been enough to make any man thoughtful. Still he asked no questions, ventured no remarks.
CHAPTER XXI
ON THE TRAIL OF THE PEARLS
The Captain of the Torentia, the ship on which Pant had secured passage in so strange a manner, was a wary old seadog. On first indication of storm he had put in behind one of those small islands that dot the seaboard, and had there lain in safety until the storm had passed. This does not mean, however, that there were no interesting occurrences on board that ship to be recorded. As yet Pant had no certain knowledge regarding that thread marked gunnysack and its rich contents of pearls. Until he had made a try for that he could not rest.
To get a look at the chicle stored there in the forward hold was not so simple a task as Pant had at first supposed it to be. To begin with, it was a long way down to it from the deck where the few passengers were allowed to promenade. No companionway or ladder led to it. When it was necessary to take the temperature of the space where the bananas were stored the simple expedient of lowering a thermometer by a string was resorted to.
“Have to go down there some way, I suppose,” he told himself. “Hand over hand perhaps. Trouble is, I have no rope, and besides there is always some one hanging about.”
It was a strange situation. He wanted very much to go down there and inspect the chicle, yet he had no legal right to do so.
“It’s not as if I meant to do anything that’s wrong,” he told himself. “If I told them what I wanted, there’s not a man on board but would help me, help me a lot too much. That’s the trouble. I dare not trust them.”
On the second day out, he discovered a loose rope coiled up close by the hatch. But all that day seamen were working or lolling about close to the hatch.
“Try it at night,” he told himself. “Use a flashlight.”
He did “try it at night.” He met with little success. Scarcely had he lowered himself to the bottom and thrown on his electric torch, than the night watch threw a more powerful light upon him, then shouted down: