He lifted the hand which Winterton held and gave it a gentle squeeze through its bandages. He turned and went out quickly. Winterton picked up the hand again and met Paul's wondering gaze.
"That boy meant that," said Winterton. "Why——"
The strain of "The Maid of Amsterdam"—the most beautiful of all sailor work songs—came aft.
"That can't stop me," Winterton went on. "We ran afoul of your old packet about 11 o'clock yesterday morning, threshing around like a wild ship—two ships of the cruiser squadron; mine and another. The Carolina has gone on in. I'm stretching a hawser over your bows with my ship. Don't you remember anything about it? No? I sent Yates and a boat's crew aboard of you. They found you and that glorious girl trying to get aft. You wanted to get to the wheel and you not able to stand. Don't remember it, eh? I reckon you don't.
"Oh, my boy, that girl and you have had the whole lot of us miserable. We reached Honolulu from Callao ten days after the Cambodia went down. Department ordered us to join the search for survivors. Whaler picked up a hundred and forty. There was a kid of a quartermaster among 'em—he and a chap named Evans—he's in the consular service—were the heroes of the whole lot. It would take me a week to tell you the things they said about you. They weren't the only ones. To me it was like a poor man finding gold—every word they dropped was a chunk of gold. Say, don't mind, if I snivel a little bit. But I'm glad, glad! You under—you old——"
"My mother——Have——"
"Got a cable from her at Honolulu. Sent a wireless to her last night. She's waiting for you now in town. Cambodia had no wireless. 'Twas a crime. Somebody ought to be hanged."
Paul nodded assent.
"Well, we combed out to the westward looking for you till it was hopeless," Winterton resumed. "We had nothing but gale upon gale. We combed through that chain of islands to the nor'west of the Hawaiians and at Midway we ran on the gang out of this ship. Oh, it isn't a pretty story: They'd made the island after being in the boats ten days. When they set fire to this ship they thought Midway was right aboard of them. None was a navigator. Second mate—a murdering hound named Morgan, who'd been taken aft from the foc'sle, was the ringleader. He killed McGavock, the skipper. The Jap cook killed the mate. Plain hellishness was at the back of it; that's all.
"McGavock had been logging both of them—knocked Morgan down one day for giving him back talk. Mate did the same to the cook. The Jap was crazy from opium smoking. After they'd done the killing they fixed the fire and the rest of the crew followed them over the side like rats—you know the kind. One of the outfit—sort of a third mate and bos'n—who'd put up a fight—they turned him adrift without water or a bite to eat. Told him to eat the oars if he got hungry; gave him the ocean to drink. Yes, that's the fellow you picked up. Miss Granville told me about it last night. He was with your father at Apia."