"I wanted to explain my conduct, my intentions, but I read in his eyes
that he understood me and I was only too glad to leave off. And there we
were looking at each other, dumb, brought up short by the question "What
next?"
"I thought Captain Anthony was a man of iron till I saw him suddenly
fling his head to the right and to the left fiercely, like a wild animal
at bay not knowing which way to break out . . . "
* * * * *
"Truly," commented Marlow, "brought to bay was not a bad comparison; a
better one than Mr. Powell was aware of. At that moment the appearance
of Flora could not but bring the tension to the breaking point. She came
out in all innocence but not without vague dread. Anthony's exclamation
on first seeing Powell had reached her in her cabin, where, it seems, she
was brushing her hair. She had heard the very words. "What are you
doing here?" And the unwonted loudness of the voice--his voice--breaking
the habitual stillness of that hour would have startled a person having
much less reason to be constantly apprehensive, than the captive of
Anthony's masterful generosity. She had no means to guess to whom the
question was addressed and it echoed in her heart, as Anthony's voice
always did. Followed complete silence. She waited, anxious, expectant,
till she could stand the strain no longer, and with the weary mental
appeal of the overburdened. "My God! What is it now?" she opened the
door of her room and looked into the saloon. Her first glance fell on
Powell. For a moment, seeing only the second officer with Anthony, she
felt relieved and made as if to draw back; but her sharpened perception
detected something suspicious in their attitudes, and she came forward
slowly.
"I was the first to see Mrs. Anthony," related Powell, "because I was
facing aft. The captain, noticing my eyes, looked quickly over his
shoulder and at once put his finger to his lips to caution me. As if I
were likely to let out anything before her! Mrs. Anthony had on a
dressing-gown of some grey stuff with red facings and a thick red cord
round her waist. Her hair was down. She looked a child; a pale-faced
child with big blue eyes and a red mouth a little open showing a glimmer
of white teeth. The light fell strongly on her as she came up to the end
of the table. A strange child though; she hardly affected one like a
child, I remember. Do you know," exclaimed Mr. Powell, who clearly must
have been, like many seamen, an industrious reader, "do you know what she
looked like to me with those big eyes and something appealing in her
whole expression. She looked like a forsaken elf. Captain Anthony had
moved towards her to keep her away from my end of the table, where the
tray was. I had never seen them so near to each other before, and it
made a great contrast. It was wonderful, for, with his beard cut to a
point, his swarthy, sunburnt complexion, thin nose and his lean head
there was something African, something Moorish in Captain Anthony. His
neck was bare; he had taken off his coat and collar and had drawn on his
sleeping jacket in the time that he had been absent from the saloon. I
seem to see him now. Mrs. Anthony too. She looked from him to me--I
suppose I looked guilty or frightened--and from me to him, trying to
guess what there was between us two. Then she burst out with a "What has
happened?" which seemed addressed to me. I mumbled "Nothing! Nothing,
ma'am," which she very likely did not hear.