“Where?” asked Lord Francis with a sign of equal perturbation.
“Forrard,” said Ronny, who had not in vain sat with the bos’n, and never now spoke of going downstairs when he should say going below. “I was standing by the rail at the end of the hurricane deck looking at the passengers playing cards on the steerage deck, when she came along. She beckoned to me to go down to her, but I turned and bolted.”
“Was she by herself?”
“No, there were a lot of people around. She wasn’t speaking to anyone nor anyone to her.”
“Are you sure it was her?”
“Quite; she smiled just as she did when she came down in the country to take me away to join mother. I liked her smile then, but I don’t now.”
“Ronny,” said his father, taking his hand and leading him aft, “I want you to promise me something; will you?”
“Yes, father,” said the boy promptly, looking straight at him with eyes that never lied.
“Then you must never leave this deck for the lower one, whether in the steerage or amidships. It’s quite big enough for a little fellow like you. You promise me?”
“Yes, father,” said Ronny, and he kept his word to something more than the letter, limiting his excursions forward to the capstan some distance from the steerage end. Perhaps he would not have gone so far, but it was here his friend the bos’n’, when his turn came, kept his watch, and sitting there Ronny was careful to turn his back upon the bow, so that by no chance might he again see that evil face with the smile he, though all unused to the world, recognized as false.