“Get into that boat!” he said, the next moment.
Harry Brackett gave a howl of terror, and shrank away.
“No, no, oh don’t!” he cried. “Don’t you leave me here. I might have to stay a week. I’d starve. I’ll do any—”
Harry Brackett’s words were choked off, abruptly. He felt himself gathered up in two powerful arms. He was half-dragged, half-lifted, over the stern of the yacht, and tumbled into the boat, headlong. Then, as he scrambled to his feet, howling for mercy, a knife flashed in the hand of Mr. Carleton. The rope was severed. The Viking shot ahead. The rowboat dropped astern. Harry Brackett, alone in the night, beheld the yacht speeding away like a shadow. A few rods away, the light waves moaned in upon a sandy beach. There was only the black, desolate island, untenanted save by sea-birds, to turn to. Like a lost and hopeless mariner, he got out an oar and paddled in to land, where, upon the beach, abandoned and overcome, he sank down and wept—a faint-hearted Crusoe, monarch of all the shadows and dreariness that he surveyed.
And now that he was in turn alone and in sight of no man, Mr. Carleton, at the wheel of the Viking, engaged in strange pantomime. He clenched his fist and shook it at imaginary foes. He struck his hand again and again upon the wheel, as though that were alive and could feel the pain of the blow. If he had suddenly lost his wits he would not have done stranger things.
“But I’ve got the yacht!” he cried, angrily. “She’ll pay me for what I’ve spent. I’ll put her through.”
And then a sudden thought struck him. He brought the Viking abruptly into the wind again, dropped the wheel, and rushed down the companionway. He threw open the door of the provision locker—and uttered a cry of rage. It was empty.
Back at the wheel now was Mr. Carleton. The lights of Stoneland Harbour shone faintly, far, far ahead. He sat, grim and troubled.
“More time wasted!” he muttered. “But I’ve got to stop. And ’twill be three o’clock before I get in. If they’ve got word there, I’m lost. And where can a man buy food at that hour of the night? I have it—the big hotel. There’ll be somebody on watch. I’ll get it by four at the latest. I’ll play the gentleman yachtsman in distress, and pay handsomely.”
But he had lost time. The night had hindered him. By day, he could have laid a straighter course. And there had been delays. It was nearly half-past three when the yacht Viking, feeling its way into the harbour of Stoneland, rounded to off the wharves, and the anchor went down. Leaving his sail set, and giving the yacht plenty of sheet, to lie easy, Mr. Carleton lifted the skiff over the rail, jumped in, and rowed ashore.