"Sure, I bes mad," he said. "'Twas only a trick, anyhow—an' I did no harm. There bain't naught for ye to be cryin' about."
He strode from the room, with old Mother Nolan still clinging to his elbow. When they reached the kitchen she loosed her clutch on his elbow.
"Denny Nolan, ye bes a fool!" she exclaimed. "Saints presarve us, Denny, what would ye be doin' wid a sprite the like o' her, wid a heart all full entirely o' gold an' diamonds an' queens an' kings?—an' girls in this very harbor, ye great ninney, wid red woman hearts in their breasts!"
The skipper stared at her for a second, muttered an oath, crushed his fur cap on his head and went out into the gray twilight, slamming the door behind him. He blundered his way up the path at the back of the harbor and held on, blindly, to the westward.
"Sure, now she'll be frighted o' me all the time," he muttered. "I was a fool to fright her so! Maybe now she'll never be marryin' wid me at all. The divil was into me! Aye, the divil himself!"
He came presently to a group of his men working in a belt of timber, and this encounter brought him back to affairs of the common day. Grabbing an axe from young Peter Leary, he set to with a fury of effort and unheeding skill that brought the slim spruces flapping to earth. Men had to jump to save themselves from being crushed. The white chips flew in the gray twilight; and Bill Brennen wondered what imp's claw had marked the skipper under the eyes and crisscrossed his temper.
The weather continued cold, cloudless and windless throughout the next three days. During that time the skipper made no effort to see Flora, but was abroad from sun-up to sun-down with the men, cutting out timber for the little church as if his life depended on it. No sight or sound of Dick Lynch came back to the harbor. This gave Bill Brennen an argument in favor of loyalty to the skipper. He preached it to the men, and it made a great impression on their simple though dangerous natures.
"There was Foxey Jack Quinn," he said. "Jack hated the skipper like we hates sea-water in our rum. Didn't he try to kill him—t'row him over the cliff—an' didn't the skipper put the comather on to him? An' then he tips and busts into the skipper's house, wid the intention o' t'iefing the money—an' where bes Foxey Jack Quinn this minute? The saints only knows!—or maybe the divil could tell ye! An' there was Dick Lynch. Dick ups an' crosses the skipper in the store, an' gets his head broke. Nex', he raises a mutiny agin the skipper an' slips his knife into a mate. Nex', he fills himself up wid rum an' sets out wid his swilin'-gun to blow the skipper's head away! An' where bes Dick Lynch this minute? Aye, where bes he! Tell me that, if ye kin—I don't know, an' ye don't know, an' the skipper himself don't know. But the saints knows!—or maybe it bes the divil himself could tell ye! Anyhow, all the luck o' this harbor bes wid the skipper an' wid them as stands true wid him. Aye, ye kin lay to that! His enemies blink out like a spark floatin' up in the air. B'ys, stick wid the skipper! He feeds ye like marchants. Already every man o' ye has more gold stored away nor ye ever see afore in all yer life, an' come spring the skipper'll be freightin' yer jewels, an' the cargo out o' the last wrack, north to St. John's, an' sellin' 'em for ye. Would ye have salved 'em widout the skipper? No. Would ye be able for to freight 'em to St. John's widout himself an' his fore-an'-after? No. An' neither would ye be able to sell 'em even if ye could freight 'em! Stand true to Black Dennis Nolan, b'ys, an' ye'll all be fat an' rich as marchants, wid never the need to wet a line at the fishin'."
Dick Lynch had gone away drunk; but not so drunk as to have forgotten to take food and a blanket with him, and to stow away on his person his share of the gold from the Durham Castle. His inflamed mind must have held a doubt as to the certainty of meeting and disposing of the skipper.
After the long spell of fine weather another "flurry" swirled out of the west, and sent the men of Chance Along into their cabins, to eat and drink and spin yarns and keep the fires roaring in the little, round stoves and blackened chimneys. Throughout the first day of storm the skipper sat by the stove in his kitchen, talking pleasantly enough to Mother Nolan and Cormick, figuring on the plans for the church which Father McQueen had left with him, but with never a question about Flora Lockhart. He was something of a dissembler, was the skipper—when his blood was cool. Mother Nolan spoke once of the girl, saying that the loneliness of Chance Along was eating her poor heart; but the skipper gave no heed to it. On the morning of the second day of the storm, after Mother Nolan had carried tea, bacon and toast to the singer and was eating her own breakfast with her grandsons, the inner door opened and Flora herself entered the kitchen. The three looked up at her in amazement. The skipper was the first to lower his eyes.