CHAPTER XVI
"AND that's what happened, sister," he said, later. "It can't be done, it can't be done. I'm going along with the Ajax, and that's all there is to it."
"I could shake you!" she cried, hysterically.
"Don't try it, sister; I'm not stuck together very well this morning."
"I knew you'd been hurt; and once I was sure that you were dead. How I have worried! You deserve a shaking," she repeated. It was a case of talk or cry.
"Believe me, I got the shaking all right."
"Your poor head!"
"Some little old good-night sign they hung on me—huh?"
"But you promised me—"
"Guilty as charged! And, say, of all the punk dancing I ever saw, those dames beat the clock! There used to be a bear out at the Bronx; he had the rheumatism, and for a peanut he'd dance those skirts to a standstill. Now, don't you worry about my head. It's solid ivory. But I wish you could have seen the Arab kid frisk my pockets. It was worth two dollars a seat, standing room only. The little rat never batted an eye-winker. Well, no more prowling alone at night. That goes. Now you toddle along to your bunk. I'm going for a wash-up. Gee! When I think of what I'm going to do to that cake of soap! I'll have the doc fix the cut."
"I still don't understand how you got here."
"Well, I'll tell you how the day you tell me what I've got that scholars haven't"; and before she could frame a reply he had disappeared into the companionway.
After the bath the doctor took six stitches in the cut and ordered William to stay in his berth until late in the afternoon. So when he came on deck at tea-time the Ajax was well down into the Red Sea. He was mildly disappointed, and he complained to Ruth over their tea-cups. There was no change in the color of the water. It might have been different in Biblical times, but there was no license for calling it red in the year nineteen-twelve. All this nonsense cheered Ruth. Apparently nothing could crush or depress the dynamic spirit of this adopted brother of hers, To be able to joke after all he had gone through!
She pondered over the whimsy of fate that had brought William's path parallel and adjacent to her own. A beautiful natural friendship like this, to bud and blossom out of a pair of shoes, her own, flitting day by day past his cellar window! It read like a fairy-story. A beautiful friendship because it was based upon protection and confidence, the very keystone of friendship.
Scarcely half a dozen passengers had heard of William's adventure; and their knowledge did not extend beyond the vague information that he had been set upon and robbed. That he had not come aboard at Port Said none suspected. Only Ruth, Camden, and the ship's officers had this side of the tale. Except for a bit of swelling and a dull-red mark against the lighter red of his hair, he struck the casual eye as being normal as usual.
Camden, because the weather was thick and hot, decided to remain below until near sunset. He had the steward put out a chair on the main deck, under his port, and all day long he loafed there in his pajamas and bath-robe, smoking and reading. When the steward came and asked him if he would be wanting tea, Camden declared that he would dress and go above for that.
At quarter after five he went into the smoke-room and had his tea there. He was reading from a bundle of American newspapers, reviewing the big league standings, when he felt the springs of the lounge bound. He looked around to behold an amiably grinning ghost.
"Where the devil did you come from?" Camden demanded. "I thought we'd lost you. I told you to go straight back to your hotel last night. Miss Jones has been frantic. Well, what happened?"
"I followed a man."
"No doubt; and got that beautiful crack on the side of the head."
"And all he got was about four sovereigns. Yea, bo!"
"You didn't have your money with you?"
"Nope. Say, but the Irish are lucky. They can't beat us for luck. There's been a jinx hanging around me for months. It's like this. Two or three years ago I got mixed up in a Black Hand row. Sent 'em up the river. But some of them friends kept tab on me, and these wops laid for me in Naples, Florence, in Rome. Ye-ah. But here's William Grogan, large as life. They finally got to my letter of credit. Naples. They tried the game once in mid-Atlantic. And I never suspected it was a wop that jumped me that night. But they didn't get the pink book with my signature. In Rangoon a new one will be waiting for me at Cook's."
"And so you think you've laid the jinx?"
"Well, it begins to look like it."
"Didn't you tell me you knew the way back to the hotel?"
"And so I did. But I was invited to Madame Rene's soo-ary—the light fantastic, very light—and I went. And then somebody hit me on the bean with a gas-pipe."
"They rooked you, of course."
"Well, you might call it petty larceny. I had only four sovereigns and an old silver watch. So I guess the joke was on them. Caught a freight from Cairo to Suez. Bunged up a little, but nothing to speak of."
Camden folded his papers. "Grogan, I'll split a pint of wine."
"Wine? Nothing doing."
"Might as well. Not a soul on board will believe you weren't off on a bender."
"Let 'em believe."
"Well, one thing is certain—you need a guardian."
"Maybe I've got one."
"Sure enough—Irish luck. You're a wonder. I know this part of the world. Not one man in a thousand would have got out of that hole."
"I had to get out," said William, gravely.
"Tell me the whole adventure."
William was agreeable. It was all a huge joke to him, of the kind he took a good deal of pleasure in telling. "But that Arab kid!" he concluded, tenderly rubbing his head. "I wish you could have seen his fiz. Mrs. Sphinx was his grandmother, take it from me."
"You won't split a bottle?"
"Nope. I take my Catawbas with the skins on."
"That reminds me. A man doesn't like to refer to those lapses where he behaves like a fool. You played the Good Samaritan that night in Brindisi. Thanks. Grogan, the truth is, I travel to keep away from New York. There I'm lost: too many friends. When I'm at sea I get away from it all and kind of get a grip on life again. You understand?"
"Sure. And so I won't drink with you. There's nothing to it."
"Nothing in this wide world," Camden agreed, staring at the floor.
It was at Aden. Camden was leaving the Ajax at that modified hell on the bleak Arabian shore. The Ajax did not drop her anchor; she simply stopped her engines and drifted slowly. Only three passengers were to disembark, Camden and two British officers who had come aboard at Port Said. The sun was just up. William wore only his pajamas and bath-robe; he had been sleeping on deck.
"Good-by and good luck," he said, as Camden started down the ladder.
"So long, Orestes; take care of yourself," called back Camden as he stepped in among the Arab boatmen.
And the deed was done, the veil rent. The short hair at the base of William's neck stood out like the hair on the back of a dog in the fighting-pit. Orestes! The grin on his lips suffered a temporary petrifaction which lasted until the Arab oarsmen were well under way. The jackal! Camden waved his hand airily. William replied with a menacing fist; but Camden was too far away to appreciate the significance of that gesture.