The Harbor of Doubt Part 27

"Yes," he said. "I arrested him myself in St. Pierre, Miquelon. I am a constable in Freekirk Head."

"Just as we understood," remarked the officer blandly. "Captain Foraker desires me to thank you for your prompt and efficient work in this matter, though I can tell you on the side, Captain Burns, that the old man is rather put out that he didn't get the fellow himself.

We chased up and down the Banks looking for him, but never got within sight of as much as his main truck sticking over the horizon.

"And the _Petrel_--that's our steamer, you know--well, sir, maybe he didn't make a fool of her. Payson, on the _Petrel_, is the ugliest man in the service, and when this fellow Schofield led him a chase of a hundred and fifty miles, and then got away among the islands of Placentia Bay, they say Payson nearly had apoplexy. So your getting him ought to be quite a feather in your cap."

"I consider that I did my duty. But would you mind telling me what you have signaled me for?" Burns resented the gossip of this young whipper-snapper of the service who seemed, despite his frankness, to have something of a patronizing air.

"Certainly. Captain Foraker desires me to tell you that he wished the prisoner transferred to the _Albatross_. We know that you are not provided with an absolutely secure place to keep the prisoner, and, as we are on our way to St. Andrews on another matter, the skipper thinks he might just as well take the fellow in and hand him over to the authorities."

"Well, I don't agree with your skipper," snapped Burns. "I got Schofield, and I'm going to deliver him. He's safe enough, don't you worry. When you go back you can tell Captain Foraker that Schofield is in perfectly good hands."

The pleasant, amiable manner of the subaltern underwent a quick change. He at once became the stern, businesslike representative of the government.

"I am sorry, Captain Burns, but I shall deliver no such message, and when I go back I shall have the criminal with me. Those are my orders, and I intend to carry them out." He turned to the six sailors sitting quietly in the boat, their oars still in the air.

"Unship oars!" he commanded. The sweeps fell away, three on each side.

"Squad on deck!" The men scrambled up the short ladder and lined up in two rows of three. At his belt each man carried a revolver and cutla.s.ses swung at their sides.

"Now," requested the officer amiably, "will you please lead me to the prisoner?"

Nat's face darkened into a scowl of black rage, and he cursed under his breath. It was just his luck, he told himself, that when he was about to triumph, some of these government loafers should come along and take the credit out of his hands.

For a moment he thought of resistance. All his crew were on deck, drawn by curiosity. But he saw they were vastly impressed by the discipline of the visitors and by their decidedly warlike appearance.

If he resisted there would be blood spilt, and he did not like the thought of that. He finally admitted to himself that the young officer was only carrying out orders, and orders that were absolutely just.

"Well, come along!" he snarled ungraciously, and started forward. The officer spoke a word of command, and the squad marched after him as he, in turn, followed Nat.

Of all this Code had been ignorant, for the conversation had taken place too far aft for him to hear. His first warning was when the sailors marched past the window and Nat reluctantly opened the door of the old storeroom.

"Officers are here to get you, Schofield," said the skipper of the _Nettie B._ "Come out."

Wonderingly, Code stepped into the sunlight and open air and saw the officer with his escort. With the resignation that he had summoned during his five days of imprisonment he accepted his fate.

"I am ready," he said. "Let's go as soon as possible."

"Captain Schofield," said the subaltern, "you are to be transferred, and I trust you will deem it advisable to go peaceably."

Catching sight of the six armed sailors, Code could not help grinning.

"There's no question about it," he said; "I will."

"Form cordon!" ordered the officer, and the sailors surrounded him--two before, two beside, and two behind. In this order they marched to the cutter.

Code was told to get in first and take a seat looking aft. He did so, and the officer dropped into the stern-sheets so as to face his prisoner. The sailors took their position, shipped their oars smartly, and the cutter was soon under way to the gunboat.

Arrived at the accommodation ladder, and on deck, Code found a vessel with white decks, glistening bra.s.s work, and discipline that shamed naval authority. The subaltern, saluting, reported to the deck-officer that his mission had been completed, and the latter, after questioning Code, ordered that he be taken to confinement quarters.

These quarters, unlike the pen on the _Nettie B._, were below the deck, but were lighted by a porthole. The room was larger, had a comfortable bunk, a small table loaded with magazines, a chair, and a sanitary porcelain washstand. The luxury of the appointments was a revelation.

There was no question of his escaping from this room he very soon discovered.

The door was of heavy oak and locked on the outside. The walls were of solid, smooth timber, and the porthole was too small to admit the possibility of his escaping through it. The roof was formed of the deck planks.

He had hardly examined his surroundings when he heard a voice in sharp command on deck, and the running of feet, creaking of blocks, and straining of sheets as sail was got on the vessel. His room presently took an acute angle to starboard, and he realized that, with the fair gale on the quarter, they must be crowding her with canvas.

He could tell by the look of the water as it flew past his port that the remainder of the trip to St. Andrews would not take long. He knew the course there from his present position must be north, a little west, across the Bay of Fundy.

The _Nettie B._, when compelled to surrender her prisoner, had rounded Nova Scotia and was on the home-stretch toward Quoddy Roads. She was, in fact, less than thirty miles away from Grande Mignon Island, and Code had thought with a great and bitter homesickness of the joy just a sight of her would be.

He longed for the white Swallowtail lighthouse with its tin swallow above; for the tumbled green-clothed granite of the harbor approaches; for the black, sharp-toothed reefs that showed on the half-water near the can-buoy, and for the procession of stately headlands to north and south, fading from sight in a mantle of purple and gray.

But most of all for the crescent of stony beach, the nestle of white cottages along the King's Road, and the green background of the mountain beyond, with Mallaby House in the very heart of it.

This had been his train of thought when Burns had opened the door to deliver him up to the gunboat, and now it returned to him as the stanch vessel under him winged her way across the blue afternoon sea.

He wondered if the _Albatross_ would pa.s.s close enough insh.o.r.e for him to get a glimpse of Mignon's tall and forbidding fog-wreathed headlands. Just a moment of this familiar sight would be balm to his bruised spirit. He felt that he could gather strength from the sight of home. He had been among aliens so long!

But no nearer than just a glimpse. He made a firm resolution never to push the prow of the _La.s.s_ into Flagg Cove until he stood clear of the charges against him. He admitted that it might take years, but his resolution was none the less strong.

His place of confinement was on the starboard side of the _Albatross_, and he was gratified after a few minutes to see the sun pouring through his porthole.

Despair had left him now, and he was quietly cheerful. With something akin to pleasure that the struggle was over, and that events were out of his hands for the time being, he settled down in his chair and picked up a magazine.

He had hardly opened it when a thought occurred to him. If the course was north a little west, how did it happen that the sun streamed into his room, which was on the east side of the ship on that course?

He sprang to the port and looked out.

The sun smote him full in the face. He strained his eyes against the horizon that was unusually clear for this foggy sea, and would have sworn that along its edge was a dark line of land. The conclusion was inevitable.

The _Albatross_ was flying directly south as fast as her whole spread of canvas could take her.

Schofield could not explain this phenomenon to himself, nor did he try. The orders that a man-of-war sailed under were none of his affair, and if the captain chose to inst.i.tute a hunt for the north pole before delivering a prisoner in port, naturally he had a perfect right to do so. It was possible, Code told himself, that another miserable wretch was to be picked up before they were both landed together.

Whatever course Captain Foraker intended to lay in the future his present one was taking him as far as possible away from Grande Mignon, St. Andrew's, and St. John's. And for this meager comfort Code Schofield was thankful.

The sun remained above the horizon until six o'clock, and then suddenly plumped into the sea. The early September darkness rushed down and, as it did so, a big Tungsten light in the ceiling of Code's room sprang into a brilliant glow, the iron cover to the porthole being shut at the same instant.

A few moments later the door of his cell was unceremoniously opened and a man entered bearing an armful of fresh clothing.

"Captain Schofield," he said, with the deference of a servant, "the captain wishes your presence at dinner. The ship's barber will be here presently. Etiquette provides that you wear these clothes. I will fix them and lay them out for you. If you care for a bath, sir, I will draw it--"

"Say, look here," exclaimed our hero with a sudden and unexpected touch of asperity, "if you're trying to kid me, old side-whiskers, you're due for the licking of your life."

He got deliberately upon his feet and removed the fishing-coat which he had worn uninterruptedly since the night at St. Pierre.

"I thought I'd read about you in that magazine or something, and had fallen asleep, but here you are still in the room. I'm going to see whether you're alive or not. No one can mention a bath to me with impunity."

He made a sudden grab for the servant, who stood with mouth open, uncertain as to whether or not he was dealing with a lunatic.