CHAPTER XXVII

A NIGHT AND A DAY

As soon as we clambered on board, dripping from our swim, Dirk dismissed me below without a word except a rough good night. I didn't know how he had come to play the part he had done in the dark adventure of the evening, nor did I give the matter much thought, for my mind was too busy with other aspects of the problem. The feeling that for so long I had been blindly groping on a forlorn quest, and that now by my enemies' own move I had suddenly accomplished not only the mission on which Jenny had sent me, but my own private revenge as well, was like the falling away of an enormous chain, or the flooding of a prison with noonday light.

As I lay on my bunk tossing in my excitement I hugged my arms across my breast and laughed into my blankets. It all seemed so miraculous, so incredible, as though Providence had planned the move and I had merely trodden an ordained path, I wondered whether I were indeed especially cared for and watched over by Heaven. Perhaps my affairs were in the keeping of a power beyond myself. But the thought was swallowed up in my exultation. For I was in a glow of excitement and couldn't sleep. I didn't want to sleep. I wanted to lie awake and let my imagination wing me away to Jenny and the meeting that was to be; for now I could say to her, "He is dead; your father need fear no more."

Again and again I pictured the scene to myself in a tumult of rapture. I wouldn't merely be going to her because she had sent for me. The joy I had felt when I learnt she wanted me was intensified a hundredfold by the knowledge that now I had fulfilled the task she had set me to do.

The consideration that I had avenged my father's murder didn't give me so much satisfaction as the knowledge that I had struck down the Captain's foe. I think revenge had become merely a shadowy sort of duty to me, whereas there was a real purpose served in freeing a living man from a lifelong persecution. It needed the bodily presence of my enemy to whip up my fury to the pitch of mortal hatred. While he sat there before me in the boat my fingers had itched for the blow. But now that the blow had been given I felt no hatred. Indeed I gave little thought to the fellow at all. My mind was turned homewards to Jenny and the welcome that awaited me; and the things that lay at my heart to say made me flush and throb as with a fever.

Between these glowing pictures I tried at times to slip in a question as to how the affair had come about, but it was too much of a puzzle for my mind to solve in its state of fervid imagining. All I could clearly know was that I had been tracked by those two men, and that somehow Dirk discovering my plight had swum silently up to the boat as it lay on the dark waters and so had saved me. For the rest, how they had tracked me, what they thought I knew, I put away for later consideration. And once again turning my mind to Jenny and all the wonder that lay ahead, I at last fell into a troubled sleep, broken by confused visions of mingled rapture and alarm.

For with the wearing of the night a reaction began to set in. Little by little my dreams turned from pleasing glimpses of Jenny to those dark, silent bodies lying motionless under the stars. Once I awoke, thinking that again I was dealing that deadly blow; and the feel of the knife as it sank with a thud into the fellow's neck was so real that I thought I had stabbed some one in my sleep. After that the delusion came again and again with sickening reiteration, till at length it seemed to be a punishment I was doomed to undergo rather than the fulfilment of a long-cherished quest. Repeatedly I kept finding myself being dragged unwillingly to the ordeal. Before me was the victim, and always he seemed to be mocking me from under his mask, as though I were the more to be pitied of the two. The fantasy grew upon me that somehow I was striking at my own heart, till it seemed at times it was my father I was bidden to kill, and then it was Dirk, and then it was Jenny herself; at which I would struggle desperately against the fatality that was forcing me on, and would wake with a terrible dread upon me. I would try to soothe myself with the pleasanter thoughts of the days ahead; but the charm had snapped; I couldn't conjure the desirable vision back into my mind; and again I would tumble off into a feverish doze to act over and over the horrible deed of the night. Every detail returned upon me vividly, and even feelings I hadn't been conscious of at the moment surged back upon me. For always there came a stealthy fingering at my hand, and then a dagger would be slipped furtively into my fingers as though the deed I was to do were evil and accursed. And always I saw the throbbing of the blood at the victim's throat, horribly intensified. And some one would be counting; and at the cry of "Time!" I would leap forward, hating the duty to which some fearful force impelled me, and strike savagely at the spot where the blood beat. Then with the flesh sucking disgustingly at the blade as I tugged to draw it free, and with a gush of blood that blinded me as I toppled forward on to my victim, I would start awake with a sense of loathsome horror as though I had been physically sick.

It was a relief to see at last the first light of the morning whitening at the chinks of the door. It wasn't long before I was into my clothes and out on deck, sluicing off the fumes of the ugly dreams which seemed to cling about me like a perspiration.

Then I looked out across the water, and identified the little boat still swaying on the foamless waves. In it I knew were those dead men, with sightless eyes wide open under their masks, gazing up at the still grey sky. It seemed of a sudden a terrible thing that they had been left to lie alone there all through the night, growing stiff and cold, and with the blood drying and thickening about their clothes and skin. As I gazed across the water it was as if I could see them; on their faces was a look of reproach as though I had done a cruel thing.

I couldn't bear the thought of it. I turned away to find Dirk, surprised that he hadn't slipped quietly out to sea during the night. But I was more surprised to learn he had already gone ashore, and wasn't expected to return till evening. He had left instruction, however, that I wasn't to leave the ship.

So there I was, imprisoned for a wearying day, with the vision ever before me of what I had done. I longed to be away from it all. Not that I was afraid that the murder would be traced to me. Somehow such an eventuality didn't occur to me; I was so weighed down with the sickening sense of blood-guiltiness which seemed to cling about me like a dripping garment, a garment soaked in blood, that I had no thought to give to any other fear than the one at my own conscience. I began to understand why a murderer should go mad.

As in the night I tried to cheer myself with the consolation that I would soon be with Jenny again. I told myself I had struck the blow for her. I hadn't been guilty of murder; rather I had been the instrument in the hands of justice and retribution. But always at my heart was that paralysing shadow which numbed me from confident thinking. I knew I had done a horrible thing, and there would be a cloud over my life to the end of my days. The sunshine would never be so bright for me again. In the beautiful breaking of the dawn there would always be something of the redness of blood. The glory of the sea would be less buoyant and splendid, for there would be a subduing sense of tragedy in the swelling and subsiding of the waves. And Jenny too!... When I thought of her now a spring and a freshness seemed to have gone out of my heart. Bitterly I said that the Shadow of Fear was over me more deeply and darkly now that the evil thing was killed.

Yet all this, I tried to persuade myself, was a silly fantasy, due to the chafing inaction of an idle day after the excitement of such a night. Once out upon the open seas I should be myself again.

Then I noticed a boat put out from shore, and make for that other boat where the dead men lay. Eagerly I watched it, wondering what it meant. On the shore a crowd had gathered, and was fast increasing. Some one had given notice of the killing. Again I looked at the boat as it rowed out from the land. In it were three men; officers, to judge by their uniform. They soon reached their destination, and for a long while seemed to be examining the corpses. But at length they hauled in the anchor and towed the deadly freight back to the shore, where I soon lost the party in the crowd.

I was all the more anxious now for Dirk's return. It seemed foolish delaying here; some incriminating evidence might lead to our being suspected. It wasn't till this moment that I realized that there was any danger threatening us from the law.

So with added anxiety to wear down my spirit I waited through that harrowing day. At length with the evening Dirk returned, and gave orders for sailing with the dawn.

He called for me before I went below, and closing the door of the cabin said, "Wull, Tommy, I've paid my debt at last."

I thought for a moment, and answered, "Yes, you said you would save my life some day."

"An' it seems I've done it, kiddy," he replied, and shook my hand.

I was too full of doubts and questionings to be moved by the sentimental aspect of the affair. I merely said, "Thank you, Dirk," and went on, "But why don't you sail quick?"

"Mustn't seem to be running away," he answered, biting at his quid and commencing to chew. "They might get thinking things."

"What do they think?" I asked.

"Mighty little," he answered. "Don't seem to have no sort of a scent. At any rate, kiddy, we're free of it. We can clear out all straight and easy to-morrow. But it's lost me a day again."

"Has he gone?" I asked.

He stopped in his chewing and spat viciously.

"Slipped clean through my fingers, blast him!" he replied.

He clenched his fist in the way I knew, and his face grew dark and ugly. "But I'll haul him in short," he added. "The v'yage an't over yet."

After a pause I said, "How was it you found me?"

"Dunno quite," he told me. "Some one pushed up against me an' said 'There's Tommy in that boat there. They'll kill him.' I couldn't see the cove what said it; he'd slipped clear away. An' for a bit I thought it were a gag to have me. But I reckons it out that if you were there I must see you clear again. So I dips in an' swims quietly up, an' that's all about it."

I knew it must have been Picardino who had sent Dirk to the rescue. I had told him of Dirk, and doubtless he could have easily identified him. But that meant he must have been following me after I left him. Had he any premonition that I might be attacked? Or was it just kindly shepherding, or even mere luck? I mentioned nothing of this to Dirk, for I wished first to unravel the mystery for myself.

I said good night, and trotted off to my bunk. I slept soundly enough that night, and with the morning was eagerly at work unfurling the sails and trimming the ship for sea.