CHAPTER XLII

A WEAK CONSPIRATOR

At dinner-time Mrs. Watson appeared in a very dainty toilette of black and white, and was installed at the captain’s right hand. She was introduced at once to Mr. Sabin, and proceeded to make herself a very agreeable companion.

“Why, I call this perfectly delightful!” was almost her first exclamation, after a swift glance at Mr. Sabin’s quiet but irreproachable dinner attire. “You can’t imagine how pleased I am to find myself once more in civilised society. I was never so dull in my life as on that poky little yacht.”

“Poky little yacht, indeed!” Mr. Watson interrupted, with a note of annoyance in his tone. “The Mayflower anyway cost me pretty well two hundred thousand dollars, and she’s nearly the largest pleasure yacht afloat.”

“I don’t care if she cost you a million dollars,” Mrs. Watson answered pettishly. “I never want to sail on her again. I prefer this infinitely.”

She laughed at Captain Ackinson, and her husband continued his dinner in silence. Mr. Sabin made a mental note of two things—first, that Mr. Watson did not treat his wife with that consideration which is supposed to be distinctive of American husbands, and secondly, that he drank a good deal of wine without becoming even a shade more amiable. His wife somewhat pointedly drank water, and turning her right shoulder upon her husband, devoted herself to the entertainment of her two companions. At the conclusion of the meal the captain was her abject slave, and Mr. Sabin was quite willing to admit that Mrs. J. B. Watson, whatever her nationality might be, was a very charming woman.

After dinner Mr. Sabin went to his lower state room for an overcoat, and whilst feeling for some cigars, heard voices in the adjoining room, which had been empty up to now.

“Won’t you come and walk with me, James?” he heard Mrs. Watson say. “It is such a nice evening, and I want to go on deck.”

“You can go without me, then,” was the gruff answer. “I’m going to have a cigar in the smoke-room.”

“You can smoke,” she reminded him, “on deck.”

“Thanks,” he replied, “but I don’t care to give my Laranagas to the winds. You would come here, and you must do the best you can. You can’t expect to have me dangling after you all the time.”

There was a silence, and then the sound of Mr. Watson’s heavy tread, as he left the state room, followed in a moment or two by the light footsteps and soft rustle of silk skirts, which indicated the departure also of his wife.

Mr. Sabin carefully enveloped himself in an ulster, and stood for a moment or two wondering whether that conversation was meant to be overheard or not. He rang the bell for the steward.

The man appeared almost immediately. Mr. Sabin had known how to ensure prompt service.

“Was it my fancy, John? or did I hear voices in the state room opposite?” Mr. Sabin asked.

“Mr. and Mrs. Watson have taken it, sir,” the man answered.

Mr. Sabin appeared annoyed.

“You know that some of my clothes are hung up there,” he remarked, “and I have been using it as a dressing-room. There are heaps of state-rooms vacant. Surely you could have found them another?”

“I did my best, sir,” the man answered, “but they seemed to take a particular fancy to that one. I couldn’t get them off it nohow.”

“Did they know,” Mr. Sabin asked carelessly, “that the room opposite was occupied?”

“Yes, sir,” the man answered. “I told them that you were in number twelve, and that you used this as a dressing-room, but they wouldn’t shift. It was very foolish of them, too, for they wanted two, one each; and they could just as well have had them together.”

“Just as well,” Mr. Sabin remarked quietly. “Thank you, John. Don’t let them know I have spoken to you about it.”

“Certainly not, sir.”

Mr. Sabin walked upon deck. As he passed the smoke-room he saw Mr. Watson stretched upon a sofa with a cigar in his mouth. Mr. Sabin smiled to himself, and passed on.

The evening promenade on deck after dinner was quite a social event on board the Calipha. As a rule the captain and Mr. Sabin strolled together, none of the other passengers, notwithstanding Mr. Sabin’s courtesy towards them, having yet attempted in any way to thrust their society upon him. But to-night, as he had half expected, the captain had already a companion. Mrs. Watson, with a very becoming wrap around her head, and a cigarette in her mouth, was walking by his side, chatting gaily most of the time, but listening also with an air of absorbed interest to the personal experiences which her questions provoked. Every now and then, as they passed Mr. Sabin, sometimes walking, sometimes gazing with an absorbed air at the distant chaos of sea and sky, she flashed a glance of invitation upon him, which he as often ignored. Once she half stopped and asked him some slight question, but he answered it briefly standing on one side, and the captain hurried her on. It was a stroke of ill-fortune, he thought to himself, the coming of these two people. He had had a clear start and a fair field; now he was suddenly face to face with a danger, the full extent of which it was hard to estimate. For he could scarcely doubt but that their coming was on his account. They had played their parts well, but they were secret agents of the German police. He smoked his cigar leisurely, the object every few minutes of many side glances and covert smiles from the delicately attired little lady, whose silken skirts, daintily raised from the ground, brushed against him every few minutes as she and her companion passed and repassed. What was their plan of action? he wondered. If it was simply to be assassination, why so elaborate an artifice? and what worse place in the world could there be for anything of the sort than the narrow confines of a small steamer? No, there was evidently something more complex on hand. Was the woman brought as a decoy? he wondered; did they really imagine him capable of being dazzled or fascinated by any woman on the earth? He smiled softly at the thought, and the sight of that smile lingering upon his lips brought her to a standstill. He heard suddenly the swish of her skirt, and her soft voice in his ear. Lower down the deck the captain’s broad shoulders were disappearing, as he passed on the way to the engineers’ room for his nightly visit of inspection.

“You have not made a single effort to rescue me,” she said reproachfully; “you are most unkind.”

Mr. Sabin lifted his cap, and removed the cigar from his teeth.

“My dear lady,” he said, “I have been suffering the pangs of the neglected, but how dared I break in upon so confidential a tête-à-tête?”

“You have little of the courage of your nation, then,” she answered laughing, “for I gave you many opportunities. But you have been engrossed with your thoughts, and they succeeded at least where I failed—you were distinctly smiling when I came upon you.”

“It was a premonition,” he began, but she raised a little white hand, flashing with rings, to his lips, and he was silent.

“Please don’t think it necessary to talk nonsense to me all the time,” she begged. “Come! I am tired—I want to sit down. Don’t you want to take my chair down by the side of the boat there? I like to watch the lights on the water, and you may talk to me—if you like.”

“Your husband,” he remarked a moment or two later, as he arranged her cushions, “does not care for the evening air?”

“It is sufficient for him,” she answered quietly, “that I prefer it. He will not leave the smoking-room until the lights are put out.”

“In an ordinary way,” he remarked, “that must be dull for you.”

“In an ordinary way, and every way,” she answered in a low tone, “I am always dull. But, after all, I must not weary a stranger with my woes. Tell me about yourself, Mr. Sabin. Are you going to America on pleasure, or have you business there?”

A faint smile flickered across Mr. Sabin’s face. He watched the white ash trembling upon his cigar for a moment before he spoke.

“I can scarcely be said to be going to America on pleasure,” he answered, “nor have I any business there. Let us agree that I am going because it is the one country in the world of any importance which I have never visited.”

“You have been a great traveller, then,” she murmured, looking up at him with innocent, wide-open eyes. “You look as though you have been everywhere. Won’t you tell me about some of the odd places you have visited?”

“With pleasure,” he answered; “but first won’t you gratify a natural and very specific curiosity of mine? I am going to a country which I have never visited before. Tell me a little about it. Let us talk about America.”

She stole a sudden, swift glance at her questioner. No, he did not appear to be watching her. His eyes were fixed idly upon the sheet of phosphorescent light which glittered in the steamer’s track. Nevertheless, she was a little uneasy.

“America,” she said, after a moment’s pause, “is the one country I detest. We are only there very seldom—when Mr. Watson’s business demands it. You could not seek for information from any one worse informed than I am.”

“How strange!” he said softly. “You are the first unpatriotic American I have ever met.”

“You should be thankful,” she remarked, “that I am an exception. Isn’t it pleasant to meet people who are different from other people?”

“In the present case it is delightful!”

“I wonder,” she said reflectively, “in which school you studied my sex, and from what particular woman you learned the art of making those little speeches?”

“I can assure you that I am a novice,” he declared.

“Then you have a wonderful future before you. You will make a courtier, Mr. Sabin.”

“I shall be happy to be the humblest of attendants in the court where you are queen.”

“Such proficiency,” she murmured, “is the hall mark of insincerity. You are not a man to be trusted, Mr. Sabin.”

“Try me,” he begged.

“I will! I will tell you a secret.”

“I will lock it in the furthest chamber of my inner consciousness.”

“I am going to America for a purpose.”

“Wonderful woman,” he murmured, “to have a purpose.”

“I am going to get a divorce!”

Mr. Sabin was suddenly thoughtful.

“I have always understood,” he said, “that the marriage laws of America are convenient.”

“They are humane. They make me thankful that I am an American.”

Mr. Sabin inclined his head slightly towards the smoking-room.

“Does your unfortunate husband know?”

“He does; and he acquiesces. He has no alternative. But is that quite nice of you, Mr. Sabin, to call my husband an unfortunate man?”

“I cannot conceive,” he said slowly, “greater misery than to have possessed and lost you.”

She laughed gaily. Mr. Sabin permitted himself to admire that laugh. It was like the tinkling of a silver bell, and her teeth were perfect.

“You are incorrigible,” she said. “I believe that if I would let you, you would make love to me.”

“If I thought,” he answered, “that you would never allow me to make love to you, I should feel like following this cigar.” He threw it into the sea.

She sighed, and tapped her little French heel upon the deck.

“What a pity that you are like all other men.”

“I will say nothing so unkind of you,” he remarked. “You are unlike any other woman whom I ever met.”

They listened together to the bells sounding from the quarter deck. It was eleven o’clock. The deck behind them was deserted, and a fine drizzling rain was beginning to fall. Mrs. Watson removed the rug from her knees regretfully.

“I must go,” she said; “do you hear how late it is?”

“You will tell me all about America,” he said, rising and drawing back her chair, “to-morrow?”

“If we can find nothing more interesting to talk about,” she said, looking up at him with a sparkle in her dark eyes. “Good-night.”

Her hand, very small and white, and very soft, lingered in his. At that moment an unpleasant voice sounded in their ears.

“Do you know the time, Violet? The lights are out all over the ship. I don’t understand what you are doing on deck.”

Mr. Watson was not pleasant to look upon. His eyes were puffy, and swollen, and he was not quite steady upon his feet. His wife looked at him in cold displeasure.

“The lights are out in the smoke-room, I suppose,” she said, “or we should not have the pleasure of seeing you. Good-night, Mr. Sabin! Thank you so much for looking after me!”

Mr. Sabin bowed and walked slowly away, lighting a fresh cigarette. If it was acting, it was very admirably done.