However, it would not do to stand there admiring the ship. “Business before pleasure,” the young man reminded himself; and, involuntarily straightening himself up as though about to board a man-of-war, Frobisher marched across the gangway, and asked the first seaman he met whether Captain Drake was aboard.
“He’s in the chart-house at this moment, sir,” answered the man; “I’ll take you to him.” And a minute later Frobisher found himself ducking his head in order to get in through the low chart-house door-way.
“Hillo! it’s you already, is it?” exclaimed Drake, looking up from a chart over which he was poring. “I didn’t expect to see you until this afternoon. Sit down and make yourself comfortable. I hope you’ve come to tell me that we are to be shipmates for this cruise,” he added, eagerly. “If I can’t persuade you to come in with me, I shall be obliged to sail shorthanded, for I’ve no time to do any more looking round now.”
“Then you can make your mind easy,” laughed Frobisher. “To tell you the simple truth, I believe I had practically made up my mind to sail with you before I said good-bye to you yesterday. Yes, I’m coming, skipper; and I hope, for both our sakes, that the voyage will turn out as successfully as you desire.”
“Good man!” heartily ejaculated the skipper, thrusting out his hand. “That’s the best news I’ve heard for a long while. Now, where’s your dunnage? I’ll show you your room, and you can settle down right away.”
“My dunnage isn’t down yet, skipper,” replied Frobisher, smiling. “I came down just to tell you what I had decided, intending to go back and fetch my traps this afternoon.”
Drake looked rather blank at hearing this. “That’s a pity,” he remarked, thoughtfully, half to himself. Then, addressing Frobisher: “Well, trot away back, and get them down here as quickly as you can, will ye? Certain events have happened since I saw you yesterday that make me anxious to leave at the very earliest moment possible, and I’ve already made arrangements to clear directly after I had seen you this afternoon.”
“I’ll be off at once, skipper,” returned Frobisher, “and be back again not later than one o’clock.” And the young man darted out of the chart-house, across the gangway, and out of the dock premises like a sprinter, leaving Drake staring open-mouthed after him.
“He certainly can take a hint quicker than any man I’ve ever met,” said that worthy, as he resumed the study of his chart.
Two hours later Frobisher was back in Kingston, had packed his belongings, and was saying good-bye to his old friend, Dick Penryn.
Neither of the men felt very happy at parting, and both, after the manner of their kind, tried to conceal their real feelings by an exaggerated show of indifference. Thus it was that their farewells were brief, almost to curtness, and to the point; and it was only as Frobisher was actually on the door-step that Dick pushed into his friend’s hands a parcel—the same parcel that had caught Frobisher’s eye that morning. It was heavy, and the recipient could not guess, even remotely, as to its contents; but he thanked Dick heartily, tucked the package under his arm, and got into the cab which had been sent for.
One last firm hand-grip, two rather husky good-byes, now that the actual moment for parting had come, and the pair were separated—one bound for the far, mysterious East, the other to return in a few days to the ship he had come to look upon as his real home.
It was with a few minutes in hand that Frobisher leapt out of his cab at the dock gates, and collected his few belongings. He paid the cabby, and, with his customary swiftness of movement, turned and started to trot quickly through the gates towards the Quernmore; but as he did so, he collided violently with another man, causing him to sit down suddenly on the hard cobbles, while Frobisher himself dropped one of his portmanteaux.
The fat policeman on duty at the entrance chuckled loudly; Frobisher laughed and picked up his bag, as he murmured an apology; but the victim on the cobbles appeared to be saying unpleasant things venomously in some language quite unfamiliar to the young lieutenant—who knew a good many—and this caused him to pause an instant and look at the man.
He was a brown, or rather, yellow man; and for a moment Frobisher took him for a Chinaman. But a second glance convinced the latter that he did not belong to that nation, nor to the Japanese, although he was undoubtedly of Eastern extraction.
Murray had no time to waste in conjectures, however, and with a hearty English “Sorry, old man!” he proceeded to the Quernmore, where Drake himself conducted him to his state-room.
Frobisher would have left his unpacking until the evening, and gone on duty at once; but Drake informed him that there was no need. All the cargo was aboard; the crew—specially selected men—were all in the forecastle; and there was nothing to be done until three o’clock, when Drake would get his papers, and the tug would arrive to help him out of the dock. Frobisher therefore unpacked and stowed his things away; afterwards getting into his first-officer’s uniform, which had been hastily adapted from his own old Navy outfit by the removal of the shoulder-straps and the “executive curl” from the gold stripes on the sleeves. He then proceeded to examine the parcel placed in his hands by Dick Penryn.
Removing the brown paper, he found a square, polished mahogany box, fastened by two hooks as well as by a lock and key; and, upon opening the lid, he gave a cry of pleasure and surprise.
Inside were a pair of most business-like large-calibre, blued revolvers, carrying the heavy .450 cartridge—serviceable weapons indeed, capable of dropping a man in his tracks at a distance of a hundred yards. In addition to the weapons themselves, there was a cavity beneath the tray in which they rested, fitted up to contain exactly one hundred rounds of ammunition, and it was this—deadly-looking, blunt-nosed bullets in brass cartridge-cases—that had made the parcel so heavy. With his eyes snapping with gratification, Frobisher locked away the case in a drawer, and went out on deck to find Drake.
As he emerged from the companion-way, he saw that the tug was already alongside; and he immediately ran up on to the bridge, so as to be ready to carry out any orders that Drake might have for him. But it appeared that the skipper intended to work his ship out of dock entirely with his own hands, so Frobisher had a few minutes in which to look round him and take in, for the last time for several months at any rate, the intimate sights around him.
The Quernmore was now slowly passing out between the pierheads, and Frobisher was keeping a sharp look-out to see that none of the crew attempted a “pierhead jump”, when he happened to catch sight of his late acquaintance of the collision. The man was standing at the extreme end of the pier, leaning against a bollard, and observing the Quernmore and her crew with a scrutiny so close as to be a little suspicious; and Murray half-turned to point him out to Drake.
He need not have troubled to do so, however, for he at once perceived that the skipper was already aware of the man’s presence. If looks went for anything, too, Drake was intensely annoyed; and the thought at once occurred to Frobisher that the presence of this yellow man might possibly have had something to do with Drake’s sudden resolution to leave during the early afternoon. He said nothing, however, at the moment, but continued to stare at the Easterner as long as he could see him clearly, in order to impress the man’s appearance and features indelibly on his memory. For a presentiment had just seized him that this man was in some strange way bound up with his own fate, and that they were destined to meet again under far different circumstances from those under which they had come together, shortly before, at the dock gates.
He had not much time or opportunity, however, to dwell at length upon such matters; for a quarter of an hour later the tug had cast off, the pilot had taken charge, and the Quernmore, under her own steam, was proceeding rapidly down the winding, traffic-laden river.
They were