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And within that same hour a nearly successful attempt had been made upon Rossland's life. Of course the facts had shown that she could not have been directly responsible for his injury, but it was a haunting thing to remember as happening almost simultaneously with her disappearance into the sea. He drew away from the window and, opening the door, went out into the night.
"I'm afraid I don't understand," said Alan, hiding his face in the smoke of his cigar and speaking with an apparent indifference which had its effect upon Rossland. "Your presence inclines me to believe that luck has rather turned against me. Where can my advantage be?" A grim seriousness settled in Rossland's eyes, and his voice became cool and hard.
He puffed at his cigar. Rossland's interference had spoiled a perfect lighting of it, and he struck another match. This time he was successful, and he was about to extinguish the burning end when he hesitated and held it until the fire touched his flesh. Mary Standish was coming through the door. Amazed by the suddenness of her appearance, he made no movement except to drop the match.
This was not the same Rossland who had told Alan to attend to his own business on board the Nome. His attitude was that of one greeting a friend, smiling and affable even before he spoke. Something inspired Alan to return the smile. Behind that smile he was admiring the man's nerve. His hand met Rossland's casually, but there was no uncertainty in the warmth of the other's grip.
There was something grimly unpleasant in his attitude as he fumbled his watch-fob and eyed the stair from above. His watchfulness sent an unexpected thrill through Alan. Like a shot his mind jumped to a conclusion. He stepped to Rossland's side and touched his arm. "Watching for Miss Standish?" he asked. "I am." There was no evasion in Rossland's words.
As an agent of John Graham Alan looked upon him as an enemy, and as an acquaintance of Mary Standish he was as much of a mystery as the girl herself. And only now, in his cabin, was Alan beginning to sense the presence of a real authority behind Rossland's attitude. He was not curious. All his life he had lived too near the raw edge of practical things to dissipate in gossipy conjecture.
Graham's men, enraged and made desperate by Rossland's death, would rush the cabin immediately. Scarcely had the thought leaped into his mind when he heard swiftly approaching shouts, the trampling of feet, and then the battering of some heavy object at the barricaded door of Sokwenna's cabin.
"Shall we go to the lower decks?" "Or the open air," she suggested. "I am afraid this smoke is upsetting me." He could feel the change in her and did not attribute it entirely to the thickness of the air. Rossland's inexplicable rudeness had disturbed her more deeply than she had admitted, he believed.
"This is a ship's matter, and you won't want to be unnecessarily mixed up in it. Come to my cabin in half an hour. I shall want to see you." The second officer and the purser were with Doctor Marston when Alan passed them, and he heard the door of Rossland's room close behind him. The ship was trembling under his feet again. They were moving away.
The girl was looking up into his eyes, smiling, and her cheek lay unashamed against his shoulder, while Rossland's face rested against her fluffy hair when they mingled closely with the other dancers. Alan turned away, an unpleasant thought of Rossland's association with Mary Standish in his mind. He strolled down into the steerage.
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