ad never seen this lady, and now he was giving orders
at her merest suggestion. But in those ten minutes he had seen her
weep, he had seen her faint, he had seen her recover herself; he had
seen her emerge from the depths of despair into something more like
self-control; he had carried her in his arms, she had laughed at him,
she had twice impulsively grasped him by the arm, she had smiled at him
three times, she had sighed twice, she had frowned once; she had swept
upon him bringing with her an impression of the mysterious. Many men
are married to women for years without seeing their wives display so
many and such varied phases; to Cleggett it seemed not so much that he
was making a new acquaintance as renewing one that had been broken off
suddenly at some distant date. Cleggett, like the true-hearted
gentleman and born romanticist that he was, resolved to serve her
without question until such time as she chose to make known to him her
motives for her actions.

"Do you know," she said, softly and gravely to Cleggett as George and
Elmer deposited the oblong box upon a spot which she indicated near the
cabin, "I have met very few men in my life who are capable of what you
are doing?"

"I?" said Cleggett, surprised. "I have done nothing."

"You have found a woman in a strange position--an unusual position,
indeed!--and you have helped her without persecuting her with
questions."

"It is nothing," murmured Cleggett.

"Would you think me too impulsive," she said, with a rare smile, "if I
told you that you are the sort of man whom women are ready to trust
implicitly almost at first sight?"

Cleggett did not permit himself to speak for fear that the thrill which
her words imparted to him would carry him too far. He bowed.

"But I think you mentioned tea?" she said. "Did I hear you say it was
orange pekoe, or did I dream that? And couldn't we have it on deck?"

While Kuroki was bringing a table and chairs on deck and busying
himself about that preparation of tea, Cleggett watched Elmer, the
squat young man, with a growing curiosity. George and Cap'n Abernethy
were also watching Elmer from a discreet distance. Even Kuroki, silent,
swift, and well-trained Kuroki, could not but steal occasional glances
at Elmer. Had Cleggett been of a less lofty and controlled spirit he
would certainly have asked questions.

For Elmer, having uncovered the zinc can and taken from it a hammer and
a large tin funnel, proceeded t