A moment later she was talking with the little Secret Service man, joining him in an effort to unravel the tangled web of mysteries that had been woven about them.
She spoke first of the ancient wood carrying schooner, of its dark foreign skipper and the bales of cloth in the hold. The little man seemed astonished.
“There,” he said, “I think you are entirely wrong. Did you ever happen to look at that skipper’s hands?”
Ruth had not.
“They’re hard as pine knots and the muscles of his arms are like wooden beams. You don’t get a man like that for smuggling or stealing. They love physical labor too much and the contentment that comes with it.”
He agreed with her when she said that the smugglers had a hand in the destruction of Black Gull. That the cache in the old fort was theirs, neither of them doubted.
When Ruth spoke of the dark seaplane Pearl had seen off Monhegan on that stormy night, he seemed greatly surprised and excited.
“Are we doing the best we can?” he asked suddenly, wrinkling his brow and looking up at the sail.
“Our level best,” said Ruth. “And if the wind holds it is good enough. See, we have gained half the distance already.”
It was true. They had now come so close to the fleeing craft that they were able to make out moving figures on her.