The Harbor of Doubt Part 11

"It wasn't me that nearly broke up the show, Pete," protested Code.

"It was mother. Of course, when Jimmie was taking her over to Castalia in his dory he told her what was in the wind. They found me at the Pembroke place, and we all went into Pembroke's ice-house, where I was to stay until after dark. Then ma started in to find out everything.

"She allowed it wasn't honorable for me to run away when the officer or lawyer was after me. She said it proved that I was guilty, and thought I ought to stay and be served with his paper. If I wasn't guilty of anything, it could be proven easily enough, she said. Poor, honest mother! She forgot that the whole matter would take weeks, if not months, and that all that time I would be idle and discontented, and spending most of my time before boards of inquiry.

"I suppose it _will_ look queer to a lot of people at the Head because I've gone. They'll say right off: 'Just as we thought! All this talk that has been going around is true,' and put me down for a criminal that ought to go to jail. That's what mother said, and the worst part of leaving her now is that she will have to stay and face the talk--and the looks that are worse than talk.

"But, Jimmie, I couldn't do it. Grande Mignon is in too bad a hole.

She needs every man who owns a schooner or a sloop or a dory to go out and catch fish and bring 'em home. The old island's got her back against the wall, and I felt that when all the trouble and danger were over for her I would go to St. John's, and let those people try and prove their case.

"They can't prove anything! But that doesn't say they won't get a judgment. I'm poor and unknown, and ignorant of law. The company is a big corporation, with lawyers and plenty of money. If somebody there is after me I haven't a chance, and they will gouge me for all they can get. You, Jimmie, and Pete know that this is so, and it was for all these reasons that I wouldn't stand my ground and let that feller serve me.

"Ma is dependent on me, and when I have sold fifteen hundred quintals of fish she will have enough to carry her along until that trouble is over. So I'm going out after the fifteen hundred quintals. Now, that's my story. We've heard Jimmie's; but how did you manage everything so well, Pete?"

Ellinwood was flattered and coughed violently over the last of his victuals.

"Hey!" yelled some hungry member of the second half. "If you fellers eat any more you'll sink the ship. Get up out o' there an' give yer betters a chance!" Ellinwood rolled a forbidding eye toward the companionway.

"Some clam-splitter on deck don't seem to know that in this here packet the youth an' beauty is allus considered fust," he rumbled ominously. No reply being forthcoming, he turned to Code.

"When ol' Bige Tanner come to me shakin' like a leaf an' said they was a feller on the steamer that would attach yer schooner an' all that ye had, because of some business about the sinkin' of the ol' _May_, I says to myself, sez I:

"'Pete,' I sez, 'we don't allow nothin' like that to spoil our cruise an' keep the skipper ash.o.r.e.' Now, Mignon isn't very big, an' I knew he would git you in a day or two if you didn't go back into the forest and hide. But I cal'lated you wouldn't want to do that, an' so I figgered the only way to beat that lawyer was to fool him before he got fair started on his search.

"I knowed you was in Castalia, an' so I thought your mother better get you some clothes an' bring 'em there. I found out that Nat Burns had taken the feller to Mis' Shannon's boardin'-house, an', knowin' that Jimmie was livin' there, I got an idee. Jimmie's told about that already. The feller bit, an' that was the end of him.

"But that wasn't the wust of it. I knew we had to get out the same evenin' if we was to git out at all, so what did I do but get Bill Rockwell here to hitch up his big double buckboard an' go out after the five men that weren't on the job.

"He had to drive clear to Great Harbor for one, but he got back with all hands about seven o'clock. Everybody in town was at supper, an'

didn't see us when we clumb aboard the _La.s.s_. When it was pitch-black we cast off the lines, an' she drifted out on the ebb tide, which just there runs easy a knot an' a half. Then we got up our headsails so as to get steerage-way on her, and bless my soul if the blocks made a creak! Might have been pullin' silk thread through a fur mitten, for all the noise.

"I was afraid fer a minute that the flash of Swallowtail Light would catch her topm'sts, but it didn't, and after an hour we were outside and layin' in sixteen fathom off Big Duck. The tide there runs three knot, and, with our headsails an' the light air o' wind, we just managed to hold her even.

"Of course, you fellers know the rest. As soon as Jimmie landed his pa.s.senger on Long Island he came out an' straight south to where we was. I had told Jimmie to tell Code in the afternoon where to meet us; and so, when it was black enough, the skipper got into his motor-dory and came out, too.

"When they climbed aboard we got up sail and laid a southwest course to round Nova Scoshy; an' here we are, nearin' Cape Race already, and dummed proud of ourselves, if I do say it."

"Proud of you, Pete, you old fox," said Schofield, getting up from the table with a sigh of immense relief. "Come on; let the second half in."

"All right, skipper," said Pete, rising to his great height and wiping his mouth with the back of his huge hand. "But wait! I almost fergot this!"

He unpinned the pocket of his waistcoat and drew forth the flimsy sheet of paper that he had picked up when Templeton had mistakenly tried to serve him.

Briefly he told the skipper its history and handed it to him.

Schofield's eyes opened wide as he saw that the paper was that of the Dominion Cable office in Freekirk Head, and he read:

"To A. TEMPLETON, "Marine Insurance Company, "St. John's, N.B.

"Come at once with summons for Cody Albert Schofield and attachment for schooner Charming La.s.s, as per former arrangements.

"BURNETT."

For a moment the signature puzzled him, and Ellinwood, grinning, stood watching his puzzled efforts to solve it.

"Skipper, if it was a mule it would kick you in the face," he remarked. "If you can't see Nat Burns in that, I can. And now you've got an idea just who's at the bottom of this thing."

Code Schofield went aft to his cabin companionway, and prepared to go below and open his log. Kent took the wheel, and Ellinwood lurched about with a critical eye upon the lashings, sheets, and general appearance of the deck.

Schofield, remembering the schooner that had attracted his eye before, looked astern for her. She had gained rapidly upon them in the half-hour he had been below. Now he could see her graceful black hull, the shadows in the great sails, and the tiny men here and there upon her deck.

"What a sailer!" he cried in involuntary admiration. "She must be an American!"

It was clear that the other schooner, even in that moderate breeze, must be making the better side of twelve knots. Schofield gave her a final admiring glance and went below.

CHAPTER X

A MYSTERY

"AUGUST 29:

"Clear. Wind W.S.W., canting to W. Moderate breeze. Knots logged to twelve, noon, 153. Position, 20 miles south, a little east of Cape Sable. End of this day."

Code closed the dirty and thumb-worn, paper-covered ledger that was the log of the Charming La.s.s and had been the log of the old May Schofield for ten years before she went down. It was the one thing he had saved. He had been on deck, taken his s.e.xtant observation, and just completed working out his position.

As he closed the old log his eye was caught by a crudely penned name near the bottom of the paper cover. The signature was Nellie Tanner's, and he remembered how, a dozen years ago, while they were playing together in the cabin of the old May, she had pretended she was captain and owned the whole boat, so that Code would have to obey her orders.

As he looked he caught the almost obliterated marks of a pencil beneath Nellie's name, and, looking closer, discovered "Nat Burns" in boyish letters.

For a moment he scowled blackly at the audacious words, and then, laughing at his foolishness, threw the book from him. Then slowly the scowl returned, and he asked himself seriously why Nat hated him so.

That there had always been an instinctive dislike between them as boys, everybody in Freekirk Head knew, and several vicious fights to a finish had emphasized it.

But since coming to manhood's estate Code had left behind him much of the rancor and intolerance of his early youth, and had considered Nat Burns merely as a disagreeable person to be left heartily alone.

But Burns had evidently not arrived at this mature point of self-education. In fact, Burns was a good example of a youth brought up without those powers of self-control that are absolutely necessary to any one who expects to take a reasonable position in society even as simple as that of Freekirk Head.

Code remembered that Nat and his father had always been inseparable companions, and that it was due to this father more than any one else that the boy had been spoiled and indulged in every way.

Michael Burns had risen to a position of considerable power in the humble life of the island. From a successful trawler he had become a successful fish-packer and shipper. Then he had felt a desire to spread his affluent wings, gone in for politics, and been appointed the squire or justice of the peace.

In this position he was commissioned by the Marine Insurance Company of St. John's as its agent and inspector on Grande Mignon Island. In his less successful days he had been a boat-builder in Gloucester and Bath, and knew much of ship construction.

For more than half a year now Code had been unable to think of Michael Burns or the old _May Schofield_ without a shudder of horror. But now that Nat was suddenly hot on the trail of revenge, he knew he must look at matters squarely and prepare to meet any trap which might be laid for him.

It seemed evident that the first aim in Nat's mind was the hounding of the man who had been the cause of his father's death; for that death had occurred at a most opportune time for the Schofields.