CHAPTER VII.—Secrets For Two.
The Strange Meeting of Annabel and Beelo. Captain Mason’s Cruel Decision. I Tell a Romantic Story and Make a Guess at Lentala’s Origin.
CAPTAIN MASON and I had a serious talk in our hut that night.
“Don’t think for a moment,” he said, “that my intentions with regard to Vancouver have been upset by a woman’s pretty face.”
“But she is very lovely,” I interposed, anxious to turn his thoughts from whatever purpose he might have.
“That is as one thinks.” I could not restrain a smile at his ungraciousness, particularly as I saw that Annabel’s effect on him had impaired his frankness. “For that matter,” he went on, “her father is blindly planning her destruction.” In answer to my look he explained: “How can a man let his avarice and cowardice make such a fool of him! Can’t he see that the king is using him as a tool to disrupt and destroy the camp, including him and his party?”
I knew, as well as I knew my own thoughts, that a terrible apprehension of a fate worse than death for us all rested on him, as on me; but we had dared not give it tongue. Both had seen the naïve inconsistency between the king’s desire that the island should not be discovered and his promise to send us away one at a time, and so had Mr. Vancouver. No foreigner straying to the island had ever left it, and none except our colony was alive on it today. But in what dreadful manner had they been disposed of? And why had we been spared so long? We had been prisoners nearly two months.
Whether these fears and speculations haunted others of the colony we were both careful not to inquire, and were prompt in suppressing every uncomfortable hint. Captain Mason and I understood that the perfect cohesion of our colony, taken with our considerable numbers, offered the sole hope for our safety; and Mr. Vancouver was secretly planning to destroy our one means of defense.
We had been sitting in silence after Captain Mason’s last speech. He broke it by saying: