this transient little comedy of
errors.
'Did you see any gold?' said Davies at last, with husky solemnity.
Something had to be said or we should defeat our own end; but I let
him say it. He had not my faith in Memmert.
'No, only mud and timber--oh, I forgot--'
'You mustn't betray the company's secrets,' I said, laughing;
'Commander von Bruening wouldn't tell us a word about the gold.'
('There's self-denial!' I said to myself.)
'Oh, I don't think it matters much,' she answered, laughing too. 'You
are only visitors.'
'That's all,' I remarked, demurely. 'Just passing travellers.'
'You will stop at Norderney?' she said, with naive anxiety. 'Herr
Davies said--'
I looked to Davies; it was his affair. Fair and square came his
answer, in blunt dog-German.
'Yes, of course, we shall. I should like to see your father again.'
Up to this moment I had been doubtful of his final decision; for ever
since our explanation at Bensersiel I had had the feeling that I was
holding his nose to a very cruel grindstone. This straight word,
clear and direct, beyond anything I had hoped for, brought me to my
senses and showed me that his mind had been working far in advance of
mine; and more, shaping a double purpose that I had never dreamt of.
'My father?' said Fraulein Dollmann; 'yes, I am sure he will be very
glad to see you.
There was no conviction in her tone, and her eyes were distant and
troubled.
'He's not at home now, is he?' I asked.
'How did you know?' (a little maidenly confusion). 'Oh, Commander von
Bruening.'
I might have added that it had been clear as daylight all along that
this visit was in the nature of an escapade of which her father might
not approve. I tried to say 'I won't tell,' without words, and may
have succeeded.
'I told Mr Davies when we first met,' she went on. 'I expect him back
very soon--to-morrow in fact; he wrote from Amsterdam. He left me at
Hamburg and has been away since. Of course, he will not know your
yacht is back again. I think he expected Mr Davies would stay in the
Baltic, as the season was so late. But--but I am sure he will be glad
to see you.'
'Is the 'Medusa' in harbour?' said Davies.
'Yes; but we are not living on her now. We are at our villa in the
Schwannallee--my stepmother and I, that is.' She added some details,
and Davies gravely pencilled down the address on a leaf of the
log-book; a formality which somehow seemed to regularize the present
position.
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