The Iron Trail | Page 3

crossed and the saucer balanced on his heel. Now, it takes years of hard work for an honest man to make a success at one thing, but Gordon never failed at anything. I ask you if a living authority on all the branches of human endeavor and a man who can beat me at 'crib' doesn't make you suspicious."
"Not at all. I've beaten you myself!"
"I was sick," said Captain Brennan.
"The man is brilliant and well educated and wealthy. It's only natural that he should excite the jealousy of a weaker intellect."
Johnny opened his lips for an explosion, then changed his mind and agreed sourly.
"He's got money, all right, and he knows how to spend it. He and his valet occupied three cabins on this ship. They say his quarters at Hope are palatial."
"My dear grampus, the mere love of luxury doesn't argue that a person is dishonest."
"Would you let a hired man help you on with your underclothes?" demanded the mariner.
"There's nothing criminal about it."
"Humph! Mrs. Gerard is different. She's all class! You don't mind her having a maid and speaking French when she runs short of English. Her daughter is like her."
"I haven't seen Miss Gerard."
"If you'd stir about the ship instead of wearing out my Morris chair you'd have that pleasure. She was on deck all morning." Captain Brennan fell silent and poked with a stubby forefinger at the ice in his glass.
"Well, out with it!" said O'Neil after a moment.
"I'd like to know the inside story of Curtis Gordon and this girl's mother."
"Why bother your head about something that doesn't concern you?" The speaker rose and began to pace the cabin floor, then, in an altered tone, inquired, "Tell me, are you going to land me and my horses at Kyak Bay?"
"That depends on the weather. It's a rotten harbor; you'll have to swim them ashore."
"Suppose it should be rough?"
"Then we'll go on, and drop you there coming back. I don't want to be caught on that shore with a southerly wind, and that's the way it usually blows."
"I can't wait," O'Neil declared. "A week's delay might ruin me. Rather than go on I'd swim ashore myself, without the horses."
"I don't make the weather at Kyak Bay. Satan himself does that. Twenty miles offshore it may be calm, and inside it may be blowing a gale. That's due to the glaciers. Those ice-fields inland and the warm air from the Japanese Current offshore kick up some funny atmospheric pranks. It's the worst spot on the coast and we'll lose a ship there some day. Why, the place isn't properly charted, let alone buoyed."
"That's nothing unusual for this coast."
"True for you. This is all a graveyard of ships and there's been many a good master's license lost because of half-baked laws from Washington. Think of a coast like this with almost no lights, no beacons nor buoys; and yet we're supposed to make time. It's fine in clear weather, but in the dark we go by guess and by God. I've stood the run longer than most of the skippers, but--"
Even as Brennan spoke the Nebraska seemed to halt, to jerk backward under his feet. O'Neil, who was standing, flung out an arm to steady himself; the empty ginger-ale bottle fell from the sideboard with a thump. Loose articles hanging against the side walls swung to and fro; the heavy draperies over Captain Johnny's bed swayed.
Brennan leaped from his chair; his ruddy face was mottled, his eyes were wide and horror-stricken.
"Damnation!" he gasped. The cabin door crashed open ahead of him and he was on the bridge, with O'Neil at his heels. They saw the first officer clinging limply to the rail; from the pilot-house window came an excited burst of Norwegian, then out of the door rushed a quartermaster.
Brennan cursed, and met the fellow with a blow which drove him sprawling back.
"Get in there, Swan," he bellowed, "and take your wheel."
"The tide swung her in!" exclaimed the mate. "The tide--My God!"
"Sweet Queen Anne!" said Brennan, more quietly. "You've ripped her belly out."
"It--was the tide," chattered the officer.
The steady, muffled beating of the machinery ceased, the ship seemed suddenly to lose her life, but it was plain that she was not aground, for she kept moving through the gloom. From down forward came excited voices as the crew poured up out of the forecastle.
Brennan leaped to the telegraph and signaled the engine-room. He was calm now, and his voice was sharp and steady.
"Go below, Mr. James, and find the extent of the damage," he directed, and a moment later the hull began to throb once more to the thrust of the propeller. Inside the wheelhouse Swan had recovered from his panic and repeated the master's orders mechanically.
The second and third officers arrived upon the bridge now, dressing as